Secrets Only Death Knows
by ChortlesOfDoom
Summary: When a snarky 8th grader named Johannes suddenly discovers they're the abandoned offspring of a pair of Grim Reapers, an impulsive decision then leaves them sneaking out of school to practice Death Scythe techniques and memorize funeral etiquette. Regret soon sets in and they're left miserable, but when a familiar man shows up, it seems that maybe things aren't so bad, after all...
1. The Epicentre

Hello! Before I proceed with the story, I'd like to get some things out of the way.

• Black Butler/Kuroshitsuji belongs to its rightful owners. This piece of writing is for entertainment purposes only.

• This story is (say what you will, I know) a self-insert, and many features are drawn from my own life. With some exceptions, names of real people have been changed or avoided, as are overly specific locations. There's no such thing as too much paranoia.

• This story contains, among other things: gore, death, suicide talk, copious amounts of swearing, infrequent sex talk, and occasional homophobia/transphobia.

I should also mention that I have a habit of revising things without warning, especially when I'm dealing with writer's block. If it's been a while since any updates, you might want to check the previous chapters in case something has changed. Or don't. Your call.

Now, without further ado...

* * *

 **Secrets Only Death Knows**

* * *

The playground smelled like death.

The clouds overhead were like omens, waves of foreboding harsh enough to make someone physically unwell, and yet—and _yet,_ not one of the hundreds of children out seemed to notice. They were laughing and tumbling about, remaining perfectly oblivious to the possibility of a catastrophe the entire time. Every single one of them so painfully and pathetically oblivious.

Except for me.

I stayed at the edge of the excitement, leaned against one of the school's walls and watching with a cold curiosity. I was so eager—is that even the word to call it?—and I didn't even know why. It made me sick.

There was screaming in my ears, white noise that made me want to throw up. But then the discomfort would falter just long enough for me to gain awareness of my surroundings, and I'd fisheye to a pair of first-graders, a red-haired boy and a girl in a brown bob and skirt. They each had a wide grin on as they started planning tests of bravery. Dares like: _"Do something bad behind the teacher's back." "Talk to that scary, mean kid."_

Or, my favourite: _"Try standing on the monkey bars."_

Redhead agreed almost instantly, and proceeded to scoot up the side, shoes squeaking on the polished, violet-coloured metal, until he was right on top. Didn't breathe, didn't move for a moment, until he managed to lift his hands and stand up, successfully balancing on the rungs.

Or not.

That's when a gust of wind kicked in, knocking him off his feet. He gave a sudden cry of panic, waved his arms around in an attempt to regain his balance. People turned, looking to see what all the commotion was about. I wanted to scream, run up there and save him, do _anything,_ but I was frozen to the spot. I couldn't even close my eyes as he fell forward, slamming his neck on the bar in front of him with a sickening crack before tumbling to the ground.

And then nothing. There was nothing but a blank darkness as far as I could see, until I suddenly heard a horrifically loud ringing in my ears and felt the breath pushed out of me, and then my vision reappeared.

I was at a school. Not my old elementary school, but—

High school, Grade 8, knee-deep in the second week of classes.

I was in front of my locker, barely standing and with one hand on the padlock, trying to remember my pass. I wondered distantly if I'd fainted for a moment—the way I was disoriented, the mess of thoughts, it definitely fit. But the things I saw, they were too vivid. Too _concrete._

I took another look at the numbers. I couldn't see a thing.

It wasn't a localized loss of vision, some spots here and there where I might've had an eyelash. Straight-up all-over fuzziness. I only panicked more when I rubbed my eyes to check and nothing changed. It wasn't too bad—I wasn't walking into walls or anything—but I couldn't even read the large-print posters on the wall, much less the tightly-spaced numbers that were difficult to discern at the best of times.

I dropped to the floor and closed my eyes, tried to distract myself with a theory on the fainting spell, daydream, whatever it was. The last thing I remembered was eavesdropping on a discussion between some sophomores, only to appear in the middle of what I hoped was nothing more than some thoughts brought on by my vivid imagination—unnervingly lurid thoughts of a stranger's death. Lovely.

Something that uncanny had to have some kind of trigger, and more than likely it was something they'd said—but to blackout from hearing some words? I couldn't, didn't want to understand what could lead to that kind of ridiculous simultaneity. And the possibility that it wasn't simply? Hell no.

I was running late as it was and had no intention of sitting and waiting to freak out completely, so I decided to instead go back to trying to get my locker open, relying only on a vague memory of how much I had to turn the dial in each direction. It worked often enough, but this was clearly not that kind of day; it must've been two dozen attempts before I just sighed and headed off to class without my things.

Maths was a short walk straight from my locker and then left, something which was thankfully one of the few things I'd remembered from day one. Simple enough not to get lost. I stopped, shuffled awkwardly up to the door. A nervous peek through the tiny window in the middle showed that the lesson had already long started, and my eyes widened slightly. Whether that was my unsuccessful safe-cracking or the trip to hell in front of my locker, hell, I had no idea, but something told me it wasn't the former.

In any case, my endeavour to remain unnoticed as I slipped through the open door was a right failure.

"Where were you? The bell rang ten minutes ago," the teacher noted, a bewildered look on his face.

"I wasn't feeling well," I muttered, taking a seat in the only empty desk left, at the very back of the room.

There was a pause before he simply shrugged and went back to writing questions on the whiteboard.

By that time, my vision had somehow—miraculously—returned to its original 20/20 state. I glanced at the kid next to me and whispered, "Hey, you have any paper I could use? And something to write with?"

He gave an annoyed sigh and roughly tore a sheet from his binder, which he handed me along with a tiny, over-sharpened pencil. I leaned back in my chair and slowly got to work.

First, my name in the corner, in the smallest, messiest, and most indiscernible font I could manage. Then the date: September 16th, 2015. And after tediously copying down each string of numbers and variables from the board, I calmly braced myself for another period wasted doing absolutely nothing.

There remained the issue of my horrifically poor focus when it came to learning. No one I knew had ever called me dumb, but when it takes two hours to do something that others finish in twenty minutes and the simplest set of instructions completely boggles your mind—if you're even able to focus long enough to hear them properly—it's hard not to think of yourself as such. ADD? Who knows.

Today was different.

Whatever happened back at my locker, something told me it was more than just a blackout. But thinking about it just then, it was more than I could handle. So I just kept working.

By the time class was over, I'd finished not only the assigned material, but the pages upon pages of old material from a few weeks ago. The speed was straight-up unnerving; some of the work wasn't even possible in that time, regardless of skill. It felt a bit like I'd known the answers all along and... forgotten and remembered suddenly, maybe. Again—whatever happened, there was more to it. That kind of burst of focus, regained memories, it didn't happen every day.

Drama wasn't too far from the usual. I made it to class just before the bell rang and leapt into one of the many empty desks in the room, dropping my things on the floor under my chair and leaning back to look at the board. The plan that day was to watch the rest of the students' short films and then play competitive charades until lunch, and I couldn't help but shrink a little at that. I was _awful_ at those.

The rules were simple: one person from each team tried to act out the same thing, and the first person to have their team guess won a point. But any and all of my attempts—if I was even able to get past my stage fright in the first place—always failed miserably, and the other team ended up getting the point. Today wasn't very different, and it wasn't even a full round before one of my teammates started yelling at me, to which I promptly replied by flipping him the bird, stomping out of the room and slamming the door behind me.

I spent the rest of the period in the bathroom, angrily scratching off flakes of chipping paint from the inside of a stall door.

Half an hour and eight fingernails full of dark green later, a wave of emotions hit me, fear and discomfort and the most harrowing gloom I could've ever imagined. And then—just for a split second, that very same orange-haired boy, sprawled in the sand with a blotchy red neck and a face jutting straight-up.

My eyes burned and I was throwing up and God knew I wanted anything but to try and walk. But I got up anyway. I left through the school's back entrance and ran, cutting straight through parking lot and the forest path, the steep downwards hill halfway through and every root and piece of trash in between. That feeling in my gut was real. And I was _terrified._

I was at the scene in minutes, lungs burning and legs numb. A few deep breaths and I slipped into the schoolyard, clutching the edges of my hoodie like it was a safety blanket. I was scared, not for myself, but for that boy. He wasn't as reckless or utterly suicidal as my brain had made him out to be, but damn if he wasn't setting off every alarm in my body. I didn't know what death looked like; all I knew was that he was absolutely covered in it.

My eyes lit up again and I fell to my knees, blind as could be and just about unconscious from the intensity. There was a throbbing pain in my head and all I could see was static for what felt like the longest time, something like a minute straight of pure darkness right up until my vision suddenly came back completely.

I almost expected to wake up when I saw that little boy, eyes wide and body all wrong. But I didn't. My head continued to ache and all I could focus on was a tall, suited man standing in the back that gave off the strangest vibe, like he didn't belong—and I mean, he didn't. He was a fucking guy in funeral clothes who just showed up out of nowhere. What the hell?!

That's when he looked at me, cocked his head and squinted his eyes slightly before suddenly yelling something my way. I didn't know who he was and I didn't know why he was here, or how no one had noticed him yet. But it was probably a good idea to run.

I headed back the way I came, straight through the thickest part of the forest. I ran until I passed out.

Whatever happened, when I came to, I was sprawled in the dirt, with tears in my jeans and a huge, searingly painful gash on the side of my face whose intensity took me so much by surprise that all I could do was scream.

It wasn't long before the screaming turned into loud bawling, which in turn faded into pathetic whining as the pain slowly became more tolerable. I was curled up in the dirt by then, with my arms around my knees and my bangs stuck to the blood and tears on my face, and my vision was already rapidly returning to its old, useless state, which only added insult to injury. I felt miserable.

I couldn't remember when, but at some point, my body decided it was enough, and I fell asleep on the ground.

 **O O O**

I woke up to a bright orange sky, with the pain in my cheek gone and dry, flaky blood the only sign I'd ever fallen. My vision was still gone, though, and I was starting to feel like whatever was going on with my eyes might be permanent. That was terrifying, for maybe no other reason at the moment than the fact that I had no way of getting back home.

I had half a mind to just start screaming for help at the top of my lungs, but even then, it was unlikely anyone would come. I was way too far off the main path, where I would've almost certainly been spotted by a student, or even a group of them—and it was way too late in the day, for that matter.

I sat there for a while, wondering what the first time crossing the street as a blind person was like, until a pair of loud, crunchy footsteps suddenly sounded behind me. The noise continued for another few seconds before it abruptly stopped, and I heard a deep, shaky, "Excuse me, are you alright?"

"No," I answered, frowning. "Something happened, I just—I can't see anything. Can't get back home."

There was a pause, before the man—or, it sounded like a man, at least—continued. "Oh, kid, that sounds terrible! Where do you live?"

"Just down the street," I replied, slowly tracing in mid-air what was hopefully an accurate map.

Another moment passed, before I heard him shuffle over, and felt his hand wrap around my arm. "Well, I was heading near there, anyway. Follow me."

"Thank you."

It was an awkward, stumbly trip, but he didn't seem to mind. He kept me from falling and I was beyond grateful for his company, but it was a little unnerving when he suddenly said, "Your eyes are the brightest green I've ever seen in my life! They're practically glowing."

I nearly choked on my own spit. "What?"

"Yes, you must get a thousand compliments on them everyday," he continued, awestruck as ever.

I managed to keep walking, but I couldn't stop thinking about his remark. My eyes were a dark, muddy hazel and they always had been. Either this guy was as senile as he sounded, or my situation wasn't nearly as simple as fainting a bunch of times and then going blind.

"Which house is it?"

"Huh?"

"Which house do you live in?"

I hesitated. "Number twenty-nine. It's white."

A minute passed, before there was a tug on my arm. I stopped.

"Are your parents home?"

"My mom's usually in the house," I answered. "I don't know. Knock."

He gave three quick raps on the door, and a few moments later, I heard it open. There was a short silence, followed by a yell: "What happened?!" The faint Slavic accent was instantly recognizable.

"Your son was passed out on the trail by the apartment blocks. Says he can't see now."

What sounded like a sharp gasp left her mouth. Mom quickly thanked the man and pulled me inside, shutting the door behind her, and then immediately bombarded me with a series of questions in Bulgarian; _Where were you? What's wrong with your eyes? Did you know the school called? Why did you do this? How did you pass out? What's wrong with your eyes? What if someone raped you while you were like that?_ —I flinched at that— _What's wrong with your eyes?_

And again; _What's wrong with your eyes?_

I stared breathlessly, confused and increasingly terrified. I begged her to tell me, tell me what was wrong with them, because I sure as hell didn't know. What was fucking wrong with them? And then—and then, she repeated what that man had said. They were bright green, not a natural kind of dark emerald, but something more like what you'd see at a costume party. Glowing.

Before I knew it, she was suddenly dragging my half-responsive body up the few steps from the door, down the hall, to the right, and then—

The bathroom. It made a little sense; my eyes were glowing, and I, even obsessed with the supernatural as I was, clearly didn't believe her. The living room was dark, dark enough that if my eyes really _were_ glowing, it'd be obvious—obvious to her and only to her. The solution? Get me to a reflective surface, shut the blinds and turn the lights off, and hope that I had enough vision to see their luminescence. After a few painful moments of mulling it over, I agreed. Mom left me alone inside the room, closed the door behind her, and flicked the switch.

The pitch-black darkness I braced myself for never came. Instead, the tight space around me was faintly illuminated by an intense, limy glow radiating from my eyes, visible as a fuzzy green blur in the mirror. Even with my vision, it was impossible not to notice it. Looking at my reflection, I couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong, something I ought to know off the top of my head. Besides the obvious—the whole _holy-shit-my-eyes-look-like-a-rave-party_ —what was it that could possibly stir me up so much?

A minute passed, and I eventually let out a defeated sigh and pulled the door open. I had Mom call my dad to take me to the hospital and shuffled over to my room, where I promptly collapsed on my bed. I still didn't know what had happened, or what was going to happen, but at this point, one thing was certain: I fucking hated Wednesdays.

 **O O O**

When Dad saw my eyes, I swear he almost had a heart attack. Poor guy; the further he progressed into old age, the more he refused to believe in the uncanny, and seeing me like that, all stumbly, squinty-eyed rave kid, must've dealt him a pretty harsh blow. The car trip was a blur—both literally and figuratively. He spared no time for panic and rushed us straight to the ER, where we were then escorted by a nurse to the on-site eye clinic.

I was in a daze the entire time, hardly understood anything that was being said. All I got from the conversation between Dad and the optometrist(?) were roughly thirty counts of _holy-shit-dat-eye-colour_ , seventeen of " _When did this all start?"—"Just now."_ , three "A _re you on drugs?"_ (Now, narcotics can absolutely impair your vision, but turn your eyes neon green, as well? I doubt it.) and one _"Your daughter is screwed, LOL,"_ and although he didn't word it exactly like that, he might as well have, given his tone of voice.

I didn't have a clue what was going on or what I was supposed to do, save for when he asked me to open my eyes wider, or when he asked me which image looked better or what letter he was pointing to. Neither the images nor the letters appeared as little more than indiscernible grey blurs, so when it came to that, I just shrugged awkwardly.

When it was finally over, he led us back into the room and sat me down on the bed. I twiddled my thumbs, waiting for an answer, until he cleared his throat and took an uncomfortable-sounding deep breath, and then began, "Well, I don't know what to say. In my entire twenty-eight years working here, I've never seen anything like this. None of the tests showed anything unusual, leading me to believe that this is honestly just some kind of crazy freak incident. The only thing I can recommend to you now is to go get a pair of glasses"—I heard him print something off his computer—"as there's nothing dangerous going on to what I can tell."

I just stared blankly, and I got the feeling that Dad was doing the same.

"That's it?" he asked, a disbelieving tone to his voice. "You couldn't find _anything_ wrong?"

"Nothing at all."

The door suddenly opened and I heard a female voice say that optometrist guy had another patient, and she then shooed us out; we stumbled back into the waiting room, dumbfounded and hardly able to move for a full minute.

I sighed and nudged him, whispering, "What did he give you? A prescription?" At first it seemed like he nodded, but he quickly caught himself and whispered a more obvious _da_ to me. I brought my fingers to my lips, nervously scratching at them with my nails. "Can you read it?"

"... No, but I doubt it's anything good," he muttered, making a _tsk_ noise.

I sighed. "Well, come on," I said, tugging at his arm. "Let's leave."

With no further possible explanation for what was going on, Dad and I drove off to the shop widely advertised as the best in town, with low prices and speedy one-hour service. He led me out of the car and into the building, where I immediately—whether through imagination or a legitimate gut feeling, I don't know—felt like everyone who was there at the moment had turned to stare at me. I stood awkwardly beside him as he handed the prescription to the receptionist. There was a short silence, followed by a surprised gasp and an incredulous "Have you really never worn glasses before this?"

"Well... yeah," I said, shrugging. "I had perfect vision until today."

"Good lord," she murmured. "This is one of the worst cases of nearsightedness I've ever seen. You're not far from being considered legally blind at this point."

Thankfully, my dad wasn't one to faint, as I'm sure he would have otherwise collapsed on the floor just then. I gave her what I hoped was a decent you-can't-be-serious look, which she must've understood because she then squeaked out, "I'm not kidding. You may have been 20/20 before, but now..."

"How do I pick my frames, then, when I can't even see them?"

"I don't know. Usually it's not a problem, people can still see well enough for that, whether with their old lenses or just because their vision isn't very bad, but in this case, I'm not sure. Do you have anything in mind?"

I shrugged.

Dad dragged me along to the displays, which I, of course, couldn't see, and asked me if I could describe what I had in mind. I didn't know how to answer; I had no idea what shapes would look good on me, nor could I check in a mirror. "Maybe... those glasses they wore in like, the 70s, 80s... I forgot what they're called."

"Aviators?" she chimed in.

"Yeah—yeah, those. Can I get something like that?"

"Will do."

"Perfect," Dad said, just the faintest hint of what was probably annoyance—or maybe frustration was a better word—in his voice. I wondered if he was still trying to accept how quickly we'd been kicked out of the clinic. "One hour?"

"Mhm."

"Then, chop-chop." He nudged me slightly. "We'll come back around 6."

I nodded and followed him out of the shop. On the way home, Dad stopped by Starbucks and got me an iced mocha, and then brought me with him to his office, where he resumed working on whatever he was doing before he came to pick me up, and I flopped face-down on the sofa, groaning as dramatically as I possibly could. "Well, I'm not just gonna sit here and bore myself for an hour. Can't you at least turn on the radio?"

A moment passed before I heard an obnoxiously fitting, morbid-sounding violin and piano duet start playing, which only heightened my groan. "Oh, damn it—just read me the news or something..."

What else could I have expected other than the epic tale of that little brat who had essentially killed _himself_ with his sheer bravery on top of those monkey bars? I shoved my face into a pillow, only managing to think, little brat? Now that—that was a little worrying.

I didn't catch anything that came after that.

Eventually, he got up and told me it was time to go, and I gladly flung myself off the sofa and ran after him. We arrived back at the clinic pretty quickly, given that it was a small town and the building itself was only a five minute or so distance from us, and he then lead me to the counter.

"Here you go," I heard the same lady as before say, and the sound of a case snapping open. "They'll be heavy."

I frowned, felt around in front of me for a moment and then picked them up. She wasn't lying about the weight; even in my hands, they felt like a sack of bricks. How I'd be able to stand them, I wasn't sure. I took a deep breath and slid them on.

At the end of the room was a large mirror, and it was there I could finally able to see myself properly for the first time in almost a day. My skin was an even sicklier shade than usual and my hair was a tangled mess, and there was still a little dried blood on my face and what looked like a chunk of dirt from earlier today lodged in the thick confines of my eyebrows. Behind a pair of thin-rimmed, silver specs were two bleary, green eyes; now that I got a good look at them, I realized exactly how peculiar they were. Specks of light seemed to randomly swirl around inside, and a dark ring encircled the pupils. Together with my new glasses, there was something incredibly familiar about my appearance that I couldn't quite place. I'd seen something like this before, and very recently, it felt like. But where?

"How are they?" Receptionist lady, whose name I then discovered was Nancy through a quick glance at her (not blurry!) name tag, had strolled over to my side and was waiting for my response with an annoyingly wide grin on her face.

"Great," I lied, struggling to suppress a frown. The lenses were so incomprehensibly thick that, along with a terrible headache that took less than a minute to show up, I was also left with a hilariously awful coke-bottle appearance. All I needed to complete the look was a set of braces and a mullet.

Dad paid and took the case, a tiny bottle of cleaning spray and a soft cloth which Nancy gave him, and the receipt, and then we headed back home. The house exploded into a flurry of questions, things I knew related to my glasses in some way but were impossible for me to follow; all I answered was a yes-or-no about my health and then promptly went to my room and flopped onto the bed with a huge sigh, curled up next to the giant me-sized plush monkey sprawled in its centre.

For a while I just lied there, staring blankly at the ceiling; when that got old, I rolled onto my side and switched to staring out the window to my left, but the dreary weather reminded me too much of this morning to bear, so I instead stared at my reflection in the bookcase next to it. A cheaply-made Rubik's two-by-two sat on top of volumes one through six of _Black Butler._ I thought about my favourite character, the hilarious resemblance I now bore to him—frankly, _all_ the Grim Reapers. Green eyes, glasses.

It was a few seconds before it hit me.

I hardly registered it. The thought was so unbelievable, so surreal, that it sent my brain screeching to a complete standstill. I burst into laughter, questioned my own sanity for a moment—and when that eventually died down, I realized it actually made sense. Witnessing a death and losing my vision like that, eyes taking on a limy, no, a _chartreuse_ glow. And that man I saw—

Chartreuse eyes and glasses. It was the signature look of the Grim Reapers, one that I was boldly wearing at that very moment. It shouldn't have been possible. But here I was.

My parents spared me the rest of the week, under the excuse that maybe something would develop. I didn't question it and I definitely didn't take it for granted. I was scared and—yeah, excited, a little giddy. But scared nonetheless. I didn't know what this meant for me or what came next, and I took that time to calm down, think things through. Just relax as best as I could.

Those few days were terribly hectic and full of identity crises, most of which I owed to my meticulous web-crawling, looking up information on, who would've guessed it, Grim Reapers—the Black Butler ones, of course. I spent hours dwelling on the fan-made descriptions spread out across multiple sources of their abilities, which included, but were not limited to; immortality and agelessness; enhanced strength, speed, endurance, and healing; powerful senses; invisibility; teleportation, which I wasn't very clear on, as some people said it was only short-range, while others said they couldn't do it at all; and one theory, which particularly resonated with me, that described death clairvoyance—the ability to foretell a person's death.

On multiple occasions I would leave the house to go on walks, heading into the massive forest behind my street to test whether or not I was capable of these feats, which were allegedly universal among Grim Reapers.

The first thing I attempted was running from one end of the forest to the other, around where it opened up to the large river that spanned the entire town and more. A regular person would achieve this in no less than an hour at walking speed. The difference was blatantly obvious; not only was I noticeably faster, but my stamina was virtually endless, which allowed me to sprint the entire time and brought me to my goal in the outrageously short time of seven minutes and fifteen seconds. Enhanced speed and endurance—check.

The second thing I attempted was lifting a fallen tree trunk, something which not even the strongest of bodybuilders could possibly achieve. After turning down a few logs, which I had somehow deemed too small, despite the fact that they were at all at least ten metres long, I found it; a giant, monster of a tree with hundreds of branches sagging onto the ground and what looked like patches of mushrooms growing on more than a few of them. I drew my hands inside my sleeves, took a deep breath, and then—

Bam. I lifted the whole thing off the ground; not a lot, but enough for it to be noticeably floating in mid-air, and enough to give me a damn near heart attack the instant I felt it move. Enhanced strength—check.

The third thing I tested, upon arriving home after the first two, was the enhanced healing. It sounds horrible, I know, but the way I went about this was taking an old X-Acto knife I had lying in my art drawer, and slicing a small, one-inch-long vertical cut on the top of my wrist. I had a pile of bandages and rubbing alcohol in case anything went wrong, but as I sat there staring at the wound, I was stunned to discover that it was healing so quickly that I could see it with my very eyes. The blood stopped within seconds, and by two minutes, when the scabbing faded and I saw the shiny red beginnings of a scar, well—the answer was pretty obvious by then. Healing? Check.

On Saturday, after having tested everything else, I decided to try my hand at teleportation and invisibility. Teleportation, after a long hour of intense concentration, I was now able to make use of for short distances of up to a few feet. Practically speaking, it wasn't much, but for a tiny little had-been human who'd been told all their life that magic wasn't real—it was more than enough. And it only got better with each attempt.

Sunday, I didn't do much. The one time I tried turning invisible, I never actually found out if I'd been successful. I didn't have the guts to ask someone and the clearing was almost entirely deserted either way, so I shelved that one for later and headed home.

I lazed around for the remainder of the day, listening to metal albums and adding the finishing touches to a self-portrait, the last of which was drawing in my coke-bottle glasses and changing my eye colour from hazel to bright chartreuse. It was odd seeing myself like that, but I figured this was me now, the kid who randomly got a bunch of magic powers and went blind.

School terrified me, but like the doctors had claimed, I was in a stable condition, and my parents told me that if I wasn't dying, I shouldn't be staying home—and considering the fact that I was now somehow capable of doing work, well, I had no excuses. I got my things ready and went to bed.

 **O O O**

Monday, September 21st.

Dressed in black skinny jeans, a plain tee, and a long, two-sizes-too-big navy blue sweater, and dragging my backpack along with one hand, I shuffled through the school's main entrance. I avoided meeting others' gazes as much as I possibly could, and as a precautionary measure in the odd case that I did lock eyes with someone, my bangs were carefully teased to their maximum volume and made to cover most of my face. Dad told me I was being paranoid, and I knew he was right, but I didn't care. If this was what got me to school that day, so be it.

When someone asked me where I'd vanished to last week, I shrugged and explained that I was down with the flu and left it at that. No one made me elaborate. The questions stopped completely by 10 o'clock and the day progressed as normal, or as normal as it could be with me in this ridiculous situation, anyway.

Phys. ed. saw my worst fear come true; I couldn't hold back my powers. When I had to run, it was difficult not to automatically sprint ahead of everyone; when we played dodgeball, it took every ounce of my strength not to throw so hard that I bruised someone; and then later, when our teacher said we could play flashlight tag for the last fifteen minutes of class, I panicked. I panicked and ran out of the room, cowered next to a vending machine with my eyes hidden as ever.

"It's personal," I told him when he came after me.

A moment passed before he replied, "Well, if you don't want to share, I won't bug you about it," and then returned to the gymnasium. I breathed a huge sigh of relief and slumped against the wall, where I spent the rest of class.

At lunch, I headed to my old school again; whether it was out of morbid curiosity or just some kind of weird impulse, I wasn't sure. I stopped by the corner store to buy a couple of overpriced pork ribs before making my way to the playground, where the first thing I noticed were the monkey bars—or rather, their absence. Though I'd expected something like this to be done, it did strike me as a little pointless. No one had ever been seriously injured on them before this; just a single kid had fallen off and killed himself, and that had been due to his own recklessness, not a design flaw. But I didn't care—after all, I didn't go there anymore, nor had I ever especially loved climbing on the monkey bars.

People were very deliberately avoiding the spot where they had been, and I didn't blame any of them. It'd been nearly a full week since the incident, but even I could sense that there was still something lingering in the air, just the faintest residue of that bleak and gloomy atmosphere that had clung to the boy's lifeless body that day like flies to honey. Just standing there made me sick to my stomach.

Classes continued as usual and I was heading home when I was struck with the awful suspicion that I was being followed. There was no one as far as the eye could see, but the feeling remained. I couldn't even begin to relax until I was in my room. And then I was worried that I'd led him to me.

The next day, I met him, an early twenties-looking man dressed in a pure black suit and a striped silver-and-black tie. He had a sharp jawline and stick-out ears, both pierced with a matching black stud and helix ring; his eyes were a shockingly bright green and were hidden behind a pair of steel Wayfarers and black, red-tipped bangs that he swept to the side. He reminded me a little of a Hot Topic.

"Could you pay attention for one minute?" he snapped.

I jumped slightly and muttered a quick apology under my breath.

He hesitated for a moment, playing awkwardly with an earring. "Listen, kid. There's something strange about you that I'd like to talk about."

"Strange?" I stopped, eyes widening as I suddenly remembered last week's events. "Oh, no... _that?_ Please tell me it's not what I think it is."

"Depends," he said, shrugging. "Are you into anime?"

"Oh, what the fuck, you're telling me I guessed _right?_ You can't be serious!"

He shook his head and chuckled, motioning to his eyes. It was with a jolt that I noticed they weren't just a regular, albeit rather intense shade of green that I'd assumed they were—they were _that_ shade of green, with spots of light swimming inside the iris and a dark ring around the pupil, and as a cloud passed over the sun, it became all but possible to ignore the bright glow radiating from them. Glasses and chartreuse eyes, I thought, for what was surely the twentieth time in the last few days. That fucking combination.

"When did this first happen to you?" he asked.

"Last week."

"Are you sure?"

"What? Yeah."

"It's just... things like this usually aren't a one time event. Chances are you've already had many episodes similar to what you experienced last week, even if you don't remember them. This one's effects were just permanent. I mean—I'm not an expert, but it's likely, if I'm going off every other recorded incident." I gave him a confused look, and he let out a long, frustrated sigh before continuing, "Have you ever experienced out-of-place love for or extreme interest towards death?"

"Oh, now that you mention it..." I furrowed my brows in thought. "Yeah, I have, though I wouldn't describe it the way you did. In my case it was more like, whenever I heard of a death or something, I felt strongly attracted to the idea, on a deep, personal level, like it was a part of me. I guess I stopped bringing it up because it was considered weird, insensitive—but looking back... the feeling was definitely there."

"I knew it. You're a classic example of what we call pureborns: a Grim Reaper by birth."

"A Grim Reaper. Like, _Black Butler,_ that kind of Grim Reaper?"

"Yep."

"I'm one."

"Yep."

"And so are you."

"Last I checked."

"Damn."

The man stopped, adjusting his glasses carefully before beginning, "First, I haven't even introduced myself yet, and I'm sorry for that. Marx Fossi. Member of the soul collecting division. You?"

A long, stomach-turning moment passed before I finally managed to let out, "I'm Johannes. Johan for short. N-nice to meet you, er..."

"Just Marx," he said, and gingerly reached out to shake my hand. "I'm gonna hate myself for suggesting this, but look: you're probably having huge difficulties already remaining seen as a human with your, um... newfound powers. Correct?"

I nodded.

"And you're up to date with the manga, right?"

I hesitated slightly before nodding again.

"So you must know what being a Reaper is like," he muttered, so softly that I barely managed to hear him. "That in mind... how would you feel about joining us as an apprentice?"

"Come again?"

"What you just heard: come and learn how to use your abilities to your advantage."

"You're kidding."

"I'm not," he said, shaking his head. "Thing is, I'm currently mentoring a small group of rookies, and adding you to the list wouldn't be a problem. Come learn a thing or two. Or stay. Either option's fine."

Being asked something like this out of the blue seemed so surreal that it hardly even registered in my brain. I couldn't believe it. First I had learned I wasn't human, and now, this. How the hell was I even supposed to reply?

"Listen, meet me here tomorrow. I can bring some print-offs of information and explain to you in greater detail what to expect if you figure you want to join. Deal?"

"Uh... deal."

Marx breathed a sigh of relief. "Right, then. This is going to sound blunt, but my break's almost over, so I'll be heading back now. Take care, Johan."

With that, he ran off, utilizing a series of short-distance teleportations as he did, until he was completely out of sight. I stared at the empty space where he had been, completely flabbergasted, for what felt like an eternity before I finally managed to recollect myself. It was already 4 o'clock by then, far past when I was supposed to be home, so, albeit with great hesitation, I started walking. Socially anxious as I was, the thought of speaking with Marx again filled me with worry, but I figured that, like he'd said, this might be the best course of action for me, and I ought to at least meet him after school; if anything, it would be the polite thing to do, even if I decided that joining wasn't for me.

Memories of this week's events kept me awake most of the night, but I eventually drifted off—and I dreamt of what it would be like to work as a Grim Reaper.


	2. A Day Like Any Other

Tuesday came and by then, most of the excitement had faded, leaving me with nothing but an unrelenting sense of foreboding just like what I'd experienced on that fateful day. I kept asking myself what the fuck I was even doing, screaming at my mind to sit down and actually think for a second; _why are you considering this?_ Every fibre of my being told me that I was making a mistake, but of course, I ignored it. I didn't care.

The day slowly went by, and the time eventually came for me to make my way to the back of the school. I sat leaned against one of the greenish walls and set my backpack beside me. Five minutes passed; then ten; then twenty; before I knew it, more than half an hour had gone by waiting for Marx, and I was ready to give up and head home, when I heard my name called somewhere in the distance. I turned to see him walking my way, a black messenger bag slung over his shoulder and—was that blood on his shoes?

"Sorry I'm late," he began, sitting next to me. "I had some... important matters I needed to tend to."

I had more than just a slight idea of what those matters might be, but it was still somewhat jarring to think of another person in that sort of context, so I tried not to linger on it; a soft smile hopefully hid my discomfort as I answered, "It's cool. You had some information to give me?"

Marx nodded, rummaging in his bag for a moment before pulling out a large brown envelope. "Here is everything you need to know as a Grim Reaper," he said, handing it to me. "I've included maps, schedules, a list of the different divisions and important people in our ranks, and the full code of conduct, among other things. I want you to carefully read over everything and make sure you're aware of what this job entails before making your final decision."

"But..." I paused, eyes narrowed. "If this is usually meant as a punishment, and I'm joining out of my own free will, then shouldn't it be alright if I decide to leave at some point?"

Marx pondered this for a moment, before cautiously replying, "Yes, I believe. That said, you really have nothing to lose. If you change your mind, then you can just leave, as you said."

"And—shit, I can't believe I forgot this; what am I going to do about my _regular_ education? Honestly, I'd just fucking drop out at this point, but..." I trailed off, unsure of how to continue.

"I doubt that'd be necessary. Classes already tend to be super loose as far as times go, and you could easily fit them into your schedule. Heck, I can try to make it so you don't even need to be present there when it's things like written work, since you can really do all that wherever you want. That's probably be like... seventy percent of them."

"Seriously?"

"Mhm. Now, I've marked where you'll be doing most of your studies, as well as how to get there. If you decide to join, meet me at the designated location this coming Monday; if not, just don't show up, and this won't be spoken of again. Simple, right?"

I nodded.

"And, uh... I recommend you stop by the tailor sometime this week. You probably don't want everyone's first impression of you to be looking like that," he said, pointing at my baggy jeans and hoodie with a chuckle.

"Oh. Yeah."

Marx took a long minute to adjust several of his earrings and his glasses before eventually continuing—it seemed to be a nervous habit of his. "Please remember, Johan: this is meant as a punishment. The main reason I suggested this was so you could make better use of your powers, not to force you to deal with all this hell. If you ever feel uncomfortable..."

"I understand. Thanks."

A short wave goodbye and I headed home.

 **O O O**

When I got back, I went to my room and sat on the bed, envelope in hand. There was nothing distinctive about it other than my name neatly printed in the middle and a small piece of decorative tape sealing it shut. I hesitated for a moment, before carefully opening it and pulling out a decently sized stack of papers, which I spread out beside me.

The first thing I looked at was a series of several different folded maps, all fastened together with a paperclip. One was of the district base, and based on all the scribbles in the margin, it was also apparently situated in a higher plane of Earth; on the back was a floor map of the main building I'd be working in, as well as a set of instructions on how to reach it all. The other one was of HQ, which was in Japan's parallel. Among the papers was also a glossary that seemed like it was typed up by Marx himself. He described Death Scythes, and how the reason they were referred to as such was because the original god of death's own weapon was a scythe; how Grim Reapers travelled through portals known as gates, which lead to a mostly relative location in their dimension, and how through strong visualization and willpower, they could use one to travel somewhere else entirely, and even create temporary portals of their own, although he stressed that this could take a massive amount of energy, especially if you hadn't practised much. He described the various powers we all had, holding surprisingly true to the millions of hypotheses I'd read just a few days ago; slang I might hear every once in a while, like deserter, a Reaper who ran away from their responsibilities, or GRD—the Grim Reaper Dispatch Association.

Continuing through the stack of papers, I also found a pocket-sized booklet titled "The Grim Reaper Code". I flipped it open and began reading. Most of it was pretty standard, only occasionally including things like "A Grim Reaper must never allow a demon to reach a soul" and "A Grim Reaper's emotions must never come before their job". Nothing too crazy. The only rule that especially bothered me was "Grim Reapers must refrain as much as possible from interacting with humans, except when required". I could see why—someone's life could be changed in such a drastic way that their date of death would be altered. But had Marx simply forgotten to mention that, or did he seriously expect me to turn into even more of a loner than I already was?

I skimmed through the rest of the pile until I came across my schedule. I had several classes a day, one of them appearing to be more or less phys. ed. for Grim Reapers, teaching things like Death Scythe techniques and how best to utilize your powers. That piqued my interest, but nothing else seemed particularly extraordinary.

I sighed and shoved everything back into the envelope.

Several days passed, with me religiously contemplating whether I wanted to join or not, considering every possible pro and con, until Thursday evening, when I finally made up my mind. My life was awful to begin with and I couldn't bring myself to believe that it could get any worse than this; if only to me, there really was nothing to lose. So, I readied my things—a black button-up shirt, dark, straight-leg jeans, and all the maps and guides that Marx had given me on how to reach my destination, and got ready for tomorrow. He was right about one thing; if I was going to start training, I needed a well-made suit.

 **O O O**

As it turned out, I wasn't even close to being as sure of myself as I'd first thought. It was only the next day that I suddenly realized how hasty a decision it really was, one that continued tearing me apart even as I darted back and forth around searching for the gate, awkwardly scribbled directions in hand and the faint beginnings of a panic attack slowly settling in my chest. It didn't help that it had been nearly an hour and I still hadn't found it, though with such a poor excuse for instructions and the fact that I was trying to find _two specific trees_ in a huge fucking forest, I'm not sure what I expected. I was honestly ready to give up when, by some kind of crazy miracle, I saw them; two birches growing next to each other that seemed no different from the rest, but on closer inspection, did look a bit strange. With trunks of identical thickness that stretched to an identical height, and even bore similar-appearing branches, it was easy to tell that something was up—and just as easy for someone to pass them by. There was just enough space between for the average person to walk through, and I could sense a faint energy coming from them, like I was standing next to a cable box, and the air within was full of distortions, leaving me certain that these were the ones.

Unsure of what else to do, I cautiously reached out my hand, and was actually quite disappointed to see that it passed right through. Although I remembered reading something about activation, I had no idea how I was supposed to pull that off. It bugged me that Marx had forgotten so many clearly important details after all the trouble he went through compiling the information, but I tried not to dwell on it. It was through complete instinct that I went on to stick my other hand inside, close my eyes, and focus all my thoughts on activating the gate. When I reopened them, I saw a crystal-clear image of what I assumed was the destination swirling between the trees and stared in awe for a moment, before slowly, ever so slowly making my way through.

I ended up in rather small city that appeared to be only slightly bigger than my own town, with wide, empty roads surrounded by tall buildings and an occasional tree here and there. The space where I'd showed up was what seemed like a tiny park, with dozens of colourful flowers and a large fountain in the middle, and cobblestone paths leading to the main streets. Looking behind me, I could see the gate I had just come in through, along with a few others near it; unlike the one back in my world, these ones were not disguised at all, and instead appeared as few-metre wide, few-metre tall metal arches covered in strange, incredibly detailed engravings of some sort. I was sure they meant something, but whatever it was, it was impossible to understand.

I again had to force myself to believe that yes, this really was happening, before I could even hope to begin the short walk to the tailor. After figuring out my position on the map, I slowly made my way down the street and stopped in front of another dull, grey building. I nervously entered and looked around. There was a stark contrast between the alien, modern look of the outside; it was decorated in a very lavish way that seemed to suit the place, with dark red walls and a black tile floor, and fine wooden furniture. I curiously walked over to the front desk, where there was a bell for customers to ring if they needed service. I pursed my lips for a moment before giving it a solid hit, and then I waited. Almost a full minute later, a frustrated-looking grey-haired woman who appeared to be physically in her late forties showed up. I smiled awkwardly, unsure of what else to do. She sighed and asked what it was I required, although by the look on her face, she probably knew even before I replied.

I never learned her name, but she seemed like a Karen, so I decided to think of her as such. Karen brought out a notebook and a couple of measuring tools and set to work, and was then back in her room nearly the same minute, only calling out "I'll be a day at most!" before shutting the door behind her. I was so surprised by her speed that for a short while after, I just stood there, entirely frozen in place, until finally, I decided to head back home.

 **O O O**

Monday came and I had my first class at 10:30, and under ideal circumstances, it would be the only one for at least a few months that interrupted my regular schooling—everything else was supposed to be either during my breaks or after school. My plan thus far was to lie to the teacher that I had a doctor's appointment, under no circumstances forgetting to mention that my dad was picking me up, which would hopefully spare me the dreaded call to the parents. If my school wasn't so obnoxiously careful about its students and attendance wasn't taken at the start of every damn class, this would've been much easier, but alas. It was obvious at this point that I would have to quickly master the art of truancy if I wanted this all to work out.

At the start of my second period class, I told the teacher that I had to leave for an appointment, and headed down to put my things in my locker and sign out at the office, where I very cautiously explained the situation, hoping they didn't catch onto my lie. Once outside, I quietly walked off to the parking lot, making sure I stayed in their blind spot the whole time. As soon as I was far enough away, I made a lightning-fast sprint for the forest and slipped into the gate, and the instant I was through, I went straight to the tailor to pick up my clothes.

After once again ringing the bell and anxiously waiting for her to show up, Karen brought out the suit, along with a shirt and tie; she then kicked me out of the room, slamming the door shut before I could even ask how to put it on. I sighed and went to the only available dressing room, quickly taking off my top and pants and putting on the shirt. I stared at the tie, cursing myself for never bothering to learn any of the methods, and trying to logically figure out how to work it; after a few tries, I got a rudimentary knot that, while far from proper, was satisfyingly impossible to distinguish from a glance. I put on the jacket and pants and quickly left for my class.

Exactly four buildings to the right of the tailor's—I wasn't sure why I'd memorized that, or how, but it was useful information to me, so I didn't care. The place was just as irritatingly grey and alien as the others, both inside and out. When I first walked in, I was greeted by a sweet-looking blonde to my right, who was seated at a desk with a thick stack of papers before her. Eyebrows raised slightly in confusion, she went on to say that I ought to have been accompanied by someone else, as was apparently the norm.

I shook my head. "It's a really long story."

"I see." She stared awkwardly at me, seeming to fixate on my eyes, or perhaps my glasses. I wasn't sure. "Will you be alright finding your way around on your own?"

"Yeah. Um, if you don't mind me asking, have you seen a Marx Fossi anywhere recently? Earrings, dyed hair, kinda emo-looking?"

"Oh, him! He was actually just here to pick something up before you came in. Though I'm not sure exactly where he went..."

"It's fine," I assured, giving a quick wave goodbye and heading off. "Thanks."

It didn't take me long to discover how ridiculously difficult to navigate the main building was, even with a floor map, and I soon regretted not accepting the help. As I continued down the halls, which were just as overly polished and modern as the rest of the building, I began to wonder how long it would take me to memorize the layout. After some ten minutes, I came across the break room, where I was told to wait. It wasn't so much a room as it was just a small outcrop of sofas and coffee machines off to the side, as nothing like a wall separated it from the hallway, leaving people free to come and go as they pleased. It was more deserted than I had expected, with an average of only two or three other people in it at any given time. Thank goodness; knowing how easily scared I was around strangers, I don't think I would have lasted if that number were any higher.

I sighed and settled down in one of the sofas. Training as a Grim Reaper... Just a few weeks ago, I would've laughed in the face of anyone who told me it was possible, yet here I was now, lounging around in their dimension—and fuck, I _still_ found it hard to believe. A few minutes went by, and Marx eventually showed up, his bag full to the brim with papers and a vaguely sour look on his face. He greeted me and asked how I was, to which I replied, "I'm okay. Nervous as shit, but... okay."

"Don't worry about it." He sat next to me and gave a long, drawn-out yawn before continuing, "Most people get nervous when they're first starting out, and that's without being in a situation like yours. Speaking of which, are you really sure about this?"

"Well..." I hesitated. "Even if I wasn't, I was bound to end up here eventually. It wouldn't have made a difference."

My point thankfully wasn't lost on him, as he seemed to gain a certain sympathy in his eyes and only gave a gentle nod of acknowledgement.

It was around that time that several others had started lingering; Marx explained that they were who I'd be working with for the next with for the next while. I just nodded. It was nearing 10:30 and I was admittedly getting a bit worried, but just then, a man shuffled into the room. Eyes half-closed and hazy, blond hair a long, tangled mess, and stubble over the entire length of a wide jaw—the classic appearance of someone recovering from a hangover. Marx immediately shot up from the sofa and glared at him.

"For Christ's sake! Are you even _trying_ to be on time?"

"Not so loud," he muttered, rubbing his head. "And sorry."

By the look on his face, it was probably taking every ounce of Marx's strength just to keep from full-on screaming at him. I just smiled uncomfortably. "Well, at least he's here now, right?"

Blond guy stopped to adjust his glasses—black, rectangular ones—and took a long, squinty look at me before slurring out something that sounded a lot like "Eh? Who dis?"

Marx went silent for a moment. "That's... Johan. Johan, meet Elliot. He's teaching alongside me..."

"Oh. Uh, nice to meet you." I gave an awkward chuckle.

"Likewise." Elliot had a very particular voice, husky with an unbelievably thick Aussie accent and remnants of a drunken lilt. There was something vaguely unnerving about the way he held himself, something that immediately set off my fight-or-flight instinct, but I reluctantly blamed it on my anxiety. Instinctual ideas about someone weren't always reliable.

Marx sighed. "Okay, now that that's settled, we should probably get going," he said, disappearing down the hall. I quickly followed.

He lead us down to what looked like a small, haphazard classroom and closed the door behind us. While Marx and Elliot got into a near fistfight at the other end of the room, I shyly went and joined the rough group of students gathered by the window, who one by one introduced themselves to me—the tall, dark-skinned man with the loose Afro and warm smile was Oscar; the timid, Asian kid who seemed to have even more nervous tics than me was Kenneth 'Kenny' Tokuda, and the chubby redhead who seemed to do nothing but quietly follow him around was Allison. I was deeply embarrassed when they decided to tell me what had brought them here, and how they'd done _it;_ I couldn't possibly bring myself to say boredom, especially knowing how poorly that could be interpreted, so when it came to that, I lied and simply said I used carbon monoxide, and no one questioned me any further.

The argument eventually died down, and Elliot grumpily flopped down in a swirly chair, leaving Marx to take the lead. I didn't even try to guess what they had been yelling about. The lesson, which mostly consisted of a long reading from a textbook of some sort, was on illnesses of the respiratory system. I couldn't understand why that knowledge would be crucial to work, but I didn't question it. Actually, I found it pretty interesting, and I was fully engrossed right until the end.

An hour passed. I was getting ready to leave when I heard Elliot call, "Hey, kid," motioning towards me. "C'mere a sec."

I awkwardly slid over, a nervous smile on my face. "What's up?"

"So because of Fossi over there, who came up with the absolutely _brilliant_ idea of shoehorning you into our group"—he said it loud enough for him to hear—"you now have three weeks of work to catch up on."

"Eh," I said, shrugging. "I once had to finish two months' worth of math. I can handle it."

"Then this should be no problem." At that, he grabbed a huge stack of papers and a textbook from one of the tables and plopped them into my hands, ignoring my completely flabbergasted expression as he gave a wide grin and continued, "Have these done no later than Friday."

I tried to interject, but by the time the words formed, he was out the door, along with everyone else, leaving me alone to try and calculate exactly how much shit I'd gotten myself into this time. The bleak sense of regret slowly settling inside me made me wonder how late it was to just fuck right the hell off and never contact these guys again; maybe buy some kind of magic power reversing potion off a wizard somewhere in a dark alley, huh? And if that didn't work...

I sighed and started heading back.


	3. Shadows and Monsters

"Emma?"

"Here."

"Andrew?"

"Here."

I didn't say anything when I was called, only deepened the frown on my face. My neighbour eventually took it upon herself to answer for me, and I thanked her silently.

I sighed and glanced at the paper on my desk. Several days ago, I'd made the wonderful discovery that my enhanced focus was a fluke, and school had once again turned into the frustrating daily ordeal I remembered it to be; I was back to piles of unfinished work, and it only added to everything else. After an awkward slip-up a few days ago, most everyone had found about my "condition", as I'd begun calling it for simplicity's sake, and they were either avoiding me like the plague—literally, for all they knew—or treating me like I was possessed by a demon. A little bit ironic, honestly. I tried not to let it bother me, but more often than not, I found myself wondering if I could bribe someone to carry out an unauthorized reaping of their souls, so that didn't work out very well, to say the least. I did occasionally appreciate the alone time, though.

I blinked hard, trying to clear my thoughts, and took another long look at the paper. Still nothing. Sigh. "Can I go to the bathroom?" I called.

"Break was ten minutes ago," he yelled back, hardly glancing at me. "You should've gone then."

"I didn't need to go ten minutes ago! Why do teachers always say that? Just—Fucking _hell,_ " I muttered, and shot up out of my desk and left, slamming the door behind me.

He—the substitute teacher, I hadn't even bothered to learn his name—didn't follow me. I wondered if he even cared to know what was wrong.

I wandered through the halls, making sure not to draw any attention to myself. I didn't have a specific destination—it wasn't like I ever used the school facilities, and I didn't actually even need to go. For a while, all I did was stare at posters on the yellowish walls like they were the most interesting thing in the world. Honestly, I would've preferred literal hellfire than division just then. I spent something like twenty minutes walking around, and after having read nearly everything in the school, I reluctantly decided to head back. That was when someone happened to appear down the hall. I didn't think much of it; he wasn't a teacher, and I didn't know him personally. I didn't think much of it at all, not until he passed me by and my mind instantly exploded into a flurry of panicked thoughts I didn't understand. Distorted images. Bits of conversation. And—

I froze, feeling my stomach lurch. It was the guy I'd seen just seconds earlier, body crumpled underneath a car and bathed in flashing red and blue lights; flesh torn up and the bones in his hands sticking out.

Fuck.

I immediately turned around, hoping to catch up to him, but he was gone without a trace. I watched the empty spot where he'd been, chest tight and eyes wide with what I was sure looked like a thousand-yard stare. A minute passed, and that was when I ended up going to the bathroom after all. I went into the farthest stall, curled up on the floor, and cried.

 **O O O**

"You got this wrong."

"What?"

"The question. You. Got. It. Wrong." Elliot remained unbelievably nonchalant as he proceeded to pull a bottle of Jack Daniel's from his bag and started drinking it right in front of me. "And this," he continued after a moment, pointing with his free hand to another point on the paper. "And this. Aaand... this."

"That's impossible! I spent three days straight doing research, and you're telling me I got all this _wrong?_ "

"Pretty much, yeah."

"Gimme that!" I growled, snatching the paper from him. I looked it up and down for a good several minutes, eyes narrowed and teeth grit tightly, until I realized that it really was absolutely impossible. I didn't get it wrong— _he was messing with me!_ "Motherfucker," I muttered, hot fury bubbling up inside me.

"What was that?"

"Eh?" I glanced back at him, face red. "Nothing. Just thinking. Can't believe I didn't get it right. More research for me, huh?"

A vague look of disdain washed over Elliot's face; I flinched, praying silently that he hadn't noticed the knowing gleam in my eyes. "Here's a blank copy," he said, handing me another sheet. "Have it done by tomorrow. Hopefully with the _right_ answers this time."

I took it and left, too pissed to say anything.

As I was walking down the hall, only stopping to grab a muffin from the break room, I heard someone call my name. I turned; it was Marx. "Yeah?"

"Um, hey. You alright?"

"Fine," I shot back, tearing a piece from the top and shoving it in my mouth. "Why?"

He paused. "Elliot being a dick again?"

" _Again?_ Jesus Christ, how often does he act like this?"

"Pretty much any time he's not black-out drunk. You'll get used to it."

"Ugh. He told me I got this wrong," I said, giving him the filled worksheet and promptly collapsing on one of the sofas, where I continued to angrily nibble at my muffin.

He adjusted his glasses and took a long look at my answers, before finally replying, "Don't even listen to him. Every single one of these is right and he knows it. Honestly? What you wrote down is way beyond what's even expected from someone as new as you. I'm actually impressed."

"Yeah, tell that to shitfaced."

Marx gave a weak smile and slipped the paper into his bag. "Anyway, look. The reason I stopped you was 'cause I noticed you were still wearing your old glasses, and—"

"What about them?"

"They don't bug you?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

I shrugged. "Yeah, they do. I've been getting bruises on my nose for weeks. But what can you do?"

"Well..." He gave an awkward smile. "You could come with me and get a specially engineered pair that's been designed to be as durable and efficient as possible. Or stick with your 21st century coke-bottles."

"I mean—sure. Yeah, I guess."

Marx led me down the hall, to a door off to the side; there was a frosted glass window bearing black text that read OPTOMETRIST, and a small, purple figurine of some sort hanging over that. I guess they were trying to lessen the perpetual gloom clinging to the place, but it wasn't really working. I frowned and followed him inside.

Almost as soon as we stepped foot into the room, an ashy-haired man looked up from his desk at us and said, "Oh, who's this?"

"This is Johan," Marx answered. "Johan, Andrew."

"New, huh?" Andrew waltzed over, taking a long, close-up look at me and stopping at my glasses. He grinned. "Damn it, Fossi, I told you to stop bringing in strays!

"You say that like it's something I do every week." He sighed. "Anyway, Johan here has been wearing these nightmares for quite a while now, and I figured I ought to do something about it. I can't imagine they're very comfortable."

I sent an awkward grin Andrew's way, hoping he wasn't too miffed about us showing up unannounced.

"Remember your prescription?" he asked me. I shook my head. "Ah. Don't worry about it. I can probably figure it out just by looking at the lenses, maybe fine-tune it later if necessary. We're all so close in eyesight that it's nearly impossible to mess up."

"Oh. Wow, okay." I paused, stared at my glasses for a moment before slipping them off and handing them to him. Andrew took a long few minutes to inspect them, looking for features I couldn't really understand—I guess maybe thickness or how much distortion they caused. At one point it seemed like he'd taken off his own glasses and peered through mine, and that was when I heard him practically do a double take.

"Impossible," he muttered.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

Andrew didn't answer; he quickly replaced my glasses and sped off somewhere inside the room, motioning for us to follow. He led Marx and I to an eye chart, where he got me set up and began the test, ignoring my confused cries.

"Now, you've probably seen this variation before, it's got circles with a cutout on one side, and you have to tell me which direction they're facing. Ready?"

"What—I thought you could figure it out just by looking. Why do I have to do this again?"

"Never mind that! Just do it."

"Fine, okay," I grumbled, taking off my specs once more. "I wonder where the cutout is? Oh, wait, I can't even see the fricking chart! I told you, I'm _blind._ Bliiind." I pointed to my eyes for emphasis.

At that, they both fell completely silent. "Seriously, what the hell's going on? Why are you guys acting like you've seen a ghost?"

"Er... Fossi, do you mind?" Andrew gave an awkward smile.

He sighed. "Alright, listen. Grim Reapers all have poor vision, correct?"

I slid my glasses back on before answering, "Yeah?"

"What you probably don't know is that how well you can see is inversely related to your eyes' brightness, and that how bright they are is related to your current physical strength and emotions."

"... And?"

"You're fucking strong, Johan. Do you have any idea how few Reapers' powers can even begin to compare?"

I stared, feeling like someone had just dropped a fifty-tonne weight in my stomach. "You've gotta be kidding."

"Nope. God, I'm tempted to try and find out who your parents are now..." He trailed off, clearly lost in thought. I paid him no mind.

"Okay, just—" I shook my head and turned to face Andrew. "Just forget about this, okay? Give me the damn glasses and leave me alone. I don't care how strong I am. For that matter, I'd rather not even think about it. This whole dumpster fire has been driving me crazy as it is."

"Er, alright," he stammered. "Hold on a few minutes."

I slumped into one of the chairs and waited. It seemed like only some ten seconds later he reappeared in front of me, a pair of round, John Lennon-esque glasses in hand. I grabbed them and left, ignoring his innocent question of whether or not I needed a case. I switched them out mid-walk, shoved the old ones into my breast pocket and made for the gate.

People stared at me on my way out. I didn't care.

The far West side of town was where all the old, crumbling buildings and unpaved roads could be found; near century-old houses and suspicious looking shops, like a tiny, decaying sharpening service, or a florist located conveniently close to the old cemetery, with narrow, overgrown alleys connecting them all. That's where I headed, cutting diagonally through the forest and the downtown area to get there. It was a strange place, one that was often maddeningly quiet and deserted, but I liked it. Nothing but you and your thoughts. Eventually, I came across an old apartment, and I proceeded to scramble up the fence and onto the roof and sat down with my bag on my lap, pulling out a half-eaten bag of beef jerky and a sketchbook.

Between drawing and taking in the magnificent view of the neighbourhood, I found myself spending almost an hour on the greenish shingles before I heard someone call out, "What are you doing up there?"

"Drawing!" I yelled back, not looking up.

"Can I come watch?"

I stopped, a strange amusement bubbling up inside me. It was only when I finally set my sketchbook aside and peered over the edge of the roof that I realized it was Marx standing there, dressed in outrageously tight jeans and a colourful sweater. He gave a hopeful smile; I just glared, immediately losing the cheery demeanour. "The drawing sucks and I'm contagiously sick!"

"Uh-huh. Need I remind you that your immune system is too powerful for that anymore?"

"Oh, shut up," I muttered, unsure if he could hear me or not. "Why are you even here?"

"Taking a walk. I've been coming here for years."

"Well, go walk in some other direction. I'm busy. " I grabbed my sketchbook and pulled it up in front of my face.

"Come on, Johan. You're acting like it's my fault."

"Sorry, it's just I'm _really fucking angry_ right now, and when I'm really fucking angry, I start taking it out on people. I need some alone time, okay? Shoo."

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

"Sure, knock yourself out. So long as you don't mind getting pushed off."

He gave something of a thankful look and then flat-out teleported next to me, startling me so much that I nearly fell. I huffed.

"What's up?"

"I don't know."

"You say that to everything."

"Yeah, right," I said, accidentally scratching a hole through the paper with my pencil; the tip of the lead had worn down so much that it'd become practically like a needle. I sighed. "You only met me a few weeks ago. How can you be so sure already?"

"I'm not. That's just a first impression. I'll have a better idea in a few more weeks."

"Ugh." I pushed up my glasses with one hand and took a moment to rub my eyes before continuing. "Okay, fine. Maybe someone else would be super excited to realize that they're some kind of ultra powerful one-in-a-million or whatever, but I'm just... no. I thought this would be cool, being a Grim Reaper, but it's not. Fuck, it would've been better if I'd ended up here through killing myself. At least then it has an end eventually. But now? There's no set date for something like that. I'm gonna be stuck here forever."

"No, that's not true," he finally answered, brows furrowed slightly. "Look, think about it rationally. A regular Grim always gets forgiven eventually, and then they head over to the afterlife, or reincarnation, or wherever they would've gone before. Right?"

"I guess."

"And in your case, there's no need for that. You haven't done anything to require forgiveness. These kinds of situations are rare, but they're always treated with understanding. So maybe it's in a thousand years, maybe it's tomorrow—whenever you decide you've had enough of this life, just bring it up. I'm sure you can get a free ride out no problem."

"Positive?"

"Yep."

"Well..." I narrowed my eyes. "Okay. But if it's not like that, _you're_ reaping me, and I don't care if you get in trouble for it."

"That's fair," he said, smiling wryly.

"Jerky?" I held out the bag; Marx shook his head. "You never eat."

"I do. I just don't need to as much as humans. A small meal once a week or so is enough to keep me going."

"Sheesh. A lot of things I don't know about you guys, huh."

"You'll learn."

I shrugged and pulled out a few pieces myself. "So, how long have you lived here?"

"Since I was born." The answer was almost automatic. When he saw my confused squint, he added, "September 14th, 1963."

"That's pretty long," I remarked, gnawing at the meat.

"Long for a human."

"Oh." I paused to erase something. "Why didn't I ever see you anywhere?"

"Because you couldn't. Invisibility, remember?"

"But how come people can still see _me?_ "

"It's not the default for you. Everything happened so gradually that you had the time to get used to your abilities, especially since you were still interacting with others during this time. So even though you can now turn yourself invisible, it's just that. Most Grim Reapers can only turn themselves _visible._ It's strange to think about, but that's likely what's going on."

"I can't, though. I can't turn invisible."

"Have you tried?"

I opened my mouth, but then I remembered, no, I hadn't. Not really, anyway. The only attempt I'd ever made, I never even found out if it had worked or not. "... No," I replied.

"Don't get discouraged," he said, hopping off the ledge with a grunt. I winced, having somewhat expected him to break something. "It took me nearly a month to figure out how to turn visible."

"Where are you going?"

"Starbucks. I'm there part-time on Thursdays and Fridays."

"Why?"

"They don't really pay us much back there," Marx explained, motioning up in what I guessed was supposed to mean the Grim Reaper Dispatch. "Food and a pretty decent shelter's free, but everything else is your responsibility." He gave a bleak chuckle.

"Part of the whole punishment thing, maybe?"

"Probably. But yeah, come visit me there sometimes. Maybe I'll give you a discount."

With that, he bounded off somewhere into the alleys, leaving me alone on the roof. For quite a while after, I just stared at the empty space where he'd been moments earlier, with a vague sense of loneliness settling inside me. It felt nice to talk. It took off the edge of staying here, kept my sanity from slipping away entirely.

I didn't hate being a Reaper. I didn't hate the powers I had, the safety I felt nowadays. What I hated was that I couldn't blend in among even them. I was still the freak, after all.

I frowned and glanced at my drawing. It was a rough sketch of a person, one with a skinny build, flowery dress, and a pair of Elvis-style sideburns that I preferred to call mini mutton chops. Although I certainly wasn't as skinny—not from the waist down, at least—and the only facial hair I could grow was the downy fuzz on my upper lip and a few stray hairs here and there, I liked to imagine that this was me. Me how I might've looked in another life.

I reluctantly added in a pair of cat's eye glasses and then closed the book.

 **O O O**

It didn't take me long to realize why I couldn't find the boy from school the next day. Turns out his name was Seth, and he was in one of my classes. Everyone kept wondering why he was absent, if he was sick or something. I couldn't bring myself to tell them—about the crash, everything. Even if they somehow happened to believe me, just the thought alone made me feel sick.

The gloom followed me throughout the day, leaving me an absolute wreck by the time three o'clock was even somewhat close. I never had any proof of what had gone down, of what my mind claimed had happened, but it was there, just like last time. I didn't want to believe it. I couldn't.

The bell rang and I was gathering my things from my desk, about to head to the last class of the day, when _they_ decided to step in: the assholes who always hung around me, making sure not even passing period was safe.

"Yo, he-she, what're you working on?"

"How I'm going to murder you guys," I muttered, books in hand. I was bluffing to hell and back, but they didn't need to know that. He-she. Only because of how I looked, which was astoundingly androgynous, with a voice and style of dress to match. I couldn't give less of a damn about what gender people perceived me to be—but they did. I almost found it funny.

"Yeah?"

"Yep, Dickhead over here with an axe to the stomach; bleed to death. Shit-for-brains, knife through the skull. Fitting, yeah? And Cunty McFuckwit!" I motioned towards him with my pencil. "How 'bout I break your arms off and ram them down your throat?"

"Original," he spat, grabbing the pencil and tossing it somewhere across the room. I raised an eyebrow. "No, seriously, what the hell is this? 'At what point during development does the body generally obtain a soul?' What kind of fucked up cult are you in?"

"None of your business, _Cunty._ " I took the paper and shoved it into my pocket. "Fuck off already, would you?"

"Aw, is it going to cry?" One of them must've noticed how hard I was struggling to maintain my composure. With the most disgustingly cocky laugh I'd ever heard, he slowly continued, "No wonder. It's because you're a—"

"I said _fuck off!_ " My vision faltered for a moment, and I instantly felt my neck break out in cold sweat; Oh no. No no no. This was bad. _Hold back. Hold back. Don't do it._

"Hey, he-she, what are you?" Shit-for-brains.

"What are you, huh?" another one hissed, practically shoving me.

 _Stop. Make it stop._ I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to keep it inside. _Make it stop make it stop make it—_

"The fuck," I heard. "The fuck? Where'd it go?"

I froze, breathless. What the hell were they talking about? Cold shoulder, or... no, that wasn't right. Though acknowledging the "it" and everything before it made me damn near want to vomit, something drove me to call out, "I'm right here."

No response.

My fists were still clenched so tightly the nails tore into my skin; for a moment, I was confused, maybe even a little scared, but then I remembered the last thought that had been running through my mind just seconds earlier. _I want to disappear._ And so my body must have obliged by doing just that—making me not only invisible, but also inaudible.

"Holy shit." My eyes widened and I repeated, "Holy shit! Can you guys hear me?"

Again, they acted as if nothing had happened. It was insane how someone who'd seen their own eyes glowing in the dark, who'd walked into another dimension like no big deal—insane how they were finding something like this hard to believe. But here I was. Invisible, inaudible, and still more than just pissed off. A wide grin slowly spread across my face, and while they continued asking themselves what the hell just happened, I immediately got up and started giving them the most creative, obnoxious versions of the middle finger I could think of while chanting insults—and no one noticed a single thing; nor did they notice as I walked over to the whiteboard and picked up a marker, that same devious smile still fresh. I waited. I waited until they turned, and then I snapped the lid off and slowly spelled out a word. Run.

Half of them tripped on their way out.

 **O O O**

Marx and Elliot were arguing again.

I sat down, resting my bag in the corner of the sofa, and sighed. Here we go again.

"—didn't fucking steal it! How many times to I have to tell you? Nobody else in this entire building even drinks whiskey! When we did that vote a few years ago, nobody gave a flying _shit._ Not a single person voted against. Jesus, stop being so paranoid already."

"Ugh. I bet it was the newbie." Elliot shot me a glare, and I flinched.

"Keep your hands off him, asshole," Marx hissed, gripping his arm and pulling him close. "You try anything and I'll fucking kill you."

Elliot snorted. "Fine. Why do you even care so much? Ya' gay for him?"

"Says you," he muttered, shoving him off. "And no. I'm straight, thank you very much. We already went over this."

"Aww." Elliot gave a sort of sarcastic grin. "That's too bad."

"Oh, piss off already." Marx huffed and sat down next to me; Elliot just shrugged and left. Thank God.

I took a deep breath. "So, uh..."

"Bi."

"Oh." It wasn't at all what I was planning on asking, but I didn't say anything. I didn't want to further dampen his mood. "What was the vote about?"

"To stop stocking whiskey in the minibar," he answered, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Not like it keeps him from sneaking in his own. That travel mug he always carries around? It's not coffee, I'll tell you that."

"Jeez. There isn't something else you can try?"

He shook his head. "Just forget about this. And by the way: do _not_ get on his nerves. At all. Especially if he's sober. I don't want you getting mauled."

I chuckled nervously.

A while passed and we eventually headed to class, where we started wrapping up the section on the respiratory system. Things I already knew. Things that shitfaced son of a bitch told me I got wrong. I paid attention nonetheless. If anything, it would improve my chance of memorization.

One of the last things Marx mentioned—Elliot was half asleep in a chair, as always—was gas-related suffocation, and I couldn't help but think of the lie I told that first day, the method I'd have used in another life. It was ironic; although I still regularly breathed, and enjoyed it as much as I could something like that _,_ it hadn't taken me long to discover that it was no longer necessary. Maybe it would come in useful the next time someone didn't flush.

I fiddled with my tie, trying to distract myself.

"Are you okay?" whispered Oscar, who was sitting next to me. He must've noticed how uncomfortable I was.

"I'm fine. Thanks." Now, the problem with being in a room full of people who killed themselves is that they _know_ when you're lying. They know when you're not feeling well, when you're not just "fine". The doubt was plastered over his entire face. "Okay," I eventually let out. "I don't want to talk about it. Sorry."

He nodded and left me alone, and that was that.

I finished up and headed home, making sure to change back into my regular clothes beforehand. I was so exhausted that I fell asleep the instant I set foot on my bed. I didn't even take off my glasses.

 **O O O**

Two months passed before I knew it.

I excitedly soared through training, diligently filling out handouts and spending inordinate amounts of time studying at the city library after school. I quickly became a regular there, arriving at 5 o'clock sharp almost every day to give a quick hello to the receptionists before disappearing somewhere between the shelves of biology books.

It was around that time that I realized something terrible: my death clairvoyance had grown even stronger. I would be sitting in an empty corner of the library, book in one hand and packet of homework in the other, when I would suddenly get these _feelings,_ where my stomach would lurch and I'd be overcome with a sickening, heart-wrenching misery for just a split second, and then it would be over. Though I had no logical way of knowing if these episodes were related to a death, at least not at those moments when I was sitting in the library, there was a very specific kind of certainty inside me that said, no, you're right, someone _did_ just die, and you _did_ just feel it from way over here.

It happened at other places, too; I vividly remember when it first occurred at school, down to the exact date and time—Thursday, October 8th, at 2:17 in the afternoon. I was quietly working at my desk just like I would any other day, when I was struck with that horrible sense of gloom. I later found out through the newspaper that a teacher from one of my many old schools had died in a car crash, and also that every person after that whose death I felt was someone I'd met before, if only for a few moments. It was quite a saddening discovery, but I didn't even want to think about how much worse it might be if I could sense _every_ person's death. How I wished all I had to deal with were overly perceptive children who'd point and cry whenever they saw me, children who could practically see the darkness clinging to my body.

It was only the second month, and I hated it more than anything. And yet—and yet, even if I quit training, nothing would change. I was a Grim Reaper, and I could never be human again; if Marx's words were to be trusted, I never even _was._

I wanted to scream.

I don't know how I managed to drag myself through the doors that day, but when I did, it was only to be greeted by another damn fight brought on by who knows what. I was sick and tired. I figured they'd draw it out for some ungodly length of time, just like when last I walked in on something like this, but it didn't take much for someone to finally step in. English, a little nasally, and absolutely _furious,_ practically screaming when he said, "For crying out loud, would you two stop already?!"

Nobody moved. I could hear my own heartbeat.

The way Elliot was looking at Marx, I could tell he was looking for him to take the blame, but it wasn't working. It took nearly a dozen apologies before Elliot was even allowed to leave, and his face was bright red the whole time.

A moment passed. Marx breathed out a massive sigh of relief. "Thank you."

I couldn't stop staring at this other man. There was nothing strange about his physical appearance; with pale skin just slightly darker than my own, short, blackish hair that was neatly slicked back, and no visible scars, like the wide cuts that were sometimes visible under the ends of Marx's sleeves, or the jagged tear over Elliot's throat that never failed to freak me out, he looked more ordinary than anything. What struck me as odd was how unbelievably out-of-place he seemed, and how... how _familiar_ he was.

Marx must've noticed the look on my face. "You alright?"

"... Yeah. Who was that?"

"Oh. Oh, that's—" He broke off, glancing back at me and giving an awkward smile. "That's... William. William T. Spears. I thought you might recognize him."


	4. Ties That Bind

How do you explain that the reason you couldn't stop staring at a mysterious stranger who just showed up is because you've been utterly infatuated with them for over a year? Simple: you don't. You clam up and don't ever mention it, because being in love with someone you've never even met is ridiculous enough—and then if, for all intents and purposes, said stranger has always been thought by you to be a fictional character? Forget it.

Class was over and Marx and I were heading back to town together when I decided to ask him about it, leaving out the part about the embarrassing year-long infatuation. He told me that, like the existence of Grim Reapers, many other things written in Black Butler were true. That while he didn't know exactly what she was if not human, Yana Toboso had a long enough lifespan that she had personally witnessed many of the events in the story. That most of the characters—like William—were real people she'd met.

"That makes sense," I eventually said. "Why's he up here, though? I thought he worked in London."

"Eh... It's kind of a long story," he answered, as we walked through the last set of double doors. "From what I can piece together, he's been helping out in another division and has to move around a lot as a result. No word on whether someone fills in for him when he's gone, or what it is he's working on."

"Forensics, maybe?"

"Who knows? I mean, even that usually keeps you in the same general area. I'd actually ask him myself, but... he's not much of a people person, if you get what I'm saying."

"It can't be that bad."

"Yeah, maybe I'm just too big of a wuss," he said, grinning. "By all means, knock yourself out. One dollar says you won't do it. Oh, and—" Marx paused. "Do you have a phone?"

I blinked. "Uh, no?"

"Oh, that's perfect. Meet me tomorrow. I'll have a surprise."

With that, he stepped through the gate, leaving me to stare blankly after him as he vanished into the forest on the other side. I took a few moments to consider what he said about William. I couldn't talk to him. Social anxiety, the fact that I was crushing hardcore, and the fact that he'd likely just yell at me if I tried to strike up a conversation would just render any and all efforts completely useless. And my logic was, if I couldn't do something, I wouldn't.

So, I headed home, quickly changed into my regular clothes before my parents noticed I was in the house, and curled up in front of the fireplace next to Topsy, the little Shih Tzu who lived with us. That lasted for about a minute before she suddenly woke up and just... stared at me, and then immediately after, stood up and sat back down several metres away from me. And continued staring.

"Not you too?"

She cocked her head slightly.

"I'm so sick," I mumbled into my sleeves. "Everyone's acting like I'm a murderer or something."

A whine; that was when I thought, _Sorry. You're giving off these vibes. It's creeping me out._

"Me too, buddy. Me too." I chuckled weakly before whipping my head back up to look at her. "Wait wait wait. Did you just talk?"

 _Yeah, why?_ went my mind. It was like speaking with someone, where you just knew what they were saying, heard it somewhere in your subconscious.

"Oh. Oh, right. Pigeons. William. Cool. This is fine." For someone who just discovered they could talk to animals, I was taking it pretty well. At least, a lot better than when I'd discovered I was a death god. I sighed. "Man, eight years... You probably have a lot to say, huh?"

She let out a sound that vaguely registered in my mind the verbal equivalent of a shrug.

"So, what does your food taste like?"

 **O O O**

I came in late the next day, so if Marx had been planning to give me whatever it was before class, well, that wasn't gonna happen.

Elliot's hangover got the better of him within ten minutes and he was passed out for the rest of the lesson, so there thankfully wasn't any fighting, and my mood was already more than good enough to focus, making that day's work a breeze.

After everyone had left the room, Marx called me over and pulled out something that looked just like a regular smartphone. He then flashed me a grin and turned it on, and the black slowly faded, leaving only crystal-clear glass save for a thin strip on the top and bottom where the hardware was probably held.

"... Dude."

"Impressive, yeah? And if you don't want people seeing your nudes or something, there's a stealth mode which turns everything opaque again. It's also waterproof, scratchproof, and shatterproof as long as you're not going out of your way to break it, and compatible with virtually everything that can utilize Wi-Fi— _and_ we get free service. Enjoy."

"Oh, this is awesome," I breathed, taking it from his hands; Marx also handed me a charger. "I forgot all about that. Future technology, right?"

"Yep. Though there wasn't much to improve as far as phones go, so you'll find this pretty similar to the ones available right now. I mean, y'know, besides the kickass holographic keyboard—"

" _Dude._ "

"... with extremely powerful particle-detecting technology that allows it to be projected pretty much anywhere that isn't a vacuum..."

I opened up the note-taking up and looked around, and found an icon that was several rectangles layered onto each other to give off a 3D effect. I tapped it and grinned as the onscreen keyboard vanished for a second and then materialized about an inch in front of the phone. One button—well, a holographic button—moved it around to any of the phone's four sides, while another changed its size, and another the opacity and colour of the projection.

"This is sick," I said, testing it out with a bunch of gibberish.

"Glad you think so. I also went ahead and added my number to your contacts," he continued with a chuckle.

"'Groucho'?" I burst out laughing. "That's amazing. Anyway, thanks."

"No problem, kiddo. See you tomorrow."

I headed home and after finishing my homework sometime in the evening, I took out my phone again and started messing around with the settings; added a heavy metal ringtone, changed the wallpaper and default keyboard colour, that kind of stuff. And after that, I decided to ask Marx something that'd been on my mind for days, at the very least as a way to continue exploring all the features.

 **You said - Today at 6:32 PM**

marx

 **You said - Today at 6:32 PM**

are you there

 **Groucho said – Today at 6:34 PM**

What's up?

 **You said – Today at 6:35 PM**

what do you do if you have to reap a bunch of souls in a really short amount of time

 **Groucho said – Today at 6:37 PM**

I've done that before, you change your body's flow of time and make yourself move faster relative to everything else

 **You said – Today at 6:40 PM**

sweet, what happens if someone else tries to interact with you

 **Groucho said – Today at 6:45 PM**

Depends.

 **Groucho said – Today at 6:47 PM**

Mortals can't do anything, you'd be too fast for them

 **Groucho said – Today at 6:47 PM**

Reapers would automatically speed up as a defense mechanism

 **You said – Today at 6:48 PM**

yeah makes sense

 **You said – Today at 6:48 PM**

especially the automatic shifting, there'd be a risk of foul play between reapers without it

 **Groucho said: Today at 6:49 PM**

Yep. I'm sure you know some people who'd happily abuse that power if it weren't the case.

 **You said – Today at 6:53 PM**

:/

 **You said – Today at 6:54 PM**

thanks for the info

I sighed and tossed the phone onto my nightstand. Maybe it'd be useful for extra time on tests, or if I was running late for something. Could I keep a little kid from dying? That... No, Reapers can't interfere with human lives...

I didn't even have time to fall into another pit of despair before I straight-up passed out—no dinner, no brushing my teeth, nothing.

At least my insomnia was getting better.

 **O O O**

You never really notice just how often people die until it's all you can do.

I thought I must've jinxed it back when I told myself how lucky I was that that it wasn't worse, that I could only foretell deaths if I was connected to the person in some way. Maybe it was just a placebo. Maybe my brain was trying to convince me that I didn't know these people. I tried to believe that was the case, but when a girl who moved here with her parents for the first time in her life—a girl whom I had absolutely no way of knowing personally—showed up in my dreams, showed up at my school a whole day later, I realized it was impossible.

She was a beautiful, tawny-skinned girl with bright blue eyes and a scar along one of her eyebrows, and in the dream, and she was walking alone in a forest. It was a dark, cloudless night, and through the faint light of the moon, I saw that she had a rope and knife in hand. I followed her for what felt like hours, just a set of invisible eyes floating nearby, until she stopped. The dream was starting to break apart at that point, but I managed to catch the end: a still of her dangling from a branch, blood dripping down from her arms. It kept coming in thick, red waves, flooding the hills and dragging me under. My own screams were the last thing I heard before my eyes snapped open and I found myself staring at my bedroom ceiling, horrified.

It was certainly more surreal than the visions I had while awake, but the message was just as clear. She was going to commit suicide, try to end her pain only to find herself in something so much worse.

I wasn't going to let her.

 **O O O**

Socially awkward as I was, befriending her—hell, just walking up to her—was a challenge, but I eventually managed, and even got her cell number. It was a start.

We talked during passing periods, about things like our favourite colours, and how our days were going. About things we liked to do. For the longest time, it felt forced, fake, nothing at all like a friendship, but I was so desperate that even this was enough. I wanted her to be okay. So frequently I'd talk about things I'd show her tomorrow, or ask her to meet me at the end of school—just to give her a reason to live a little longer. Laura never mentioned anything about a low mood to me, but I knew better. Hell, sometimes I could feel remnants of that dark aura nearby, little pieces of death begging to overtake her, and I was scared. I didn't try to deny it.

Just to be clear, I don't condone stalking of any sort, but it wasn't long before my paranoia ended up getting the best of me, and so I often spent entire hours following Laura after school, under a mask of invisibility, to make sure she was still alive. I couldn't imagine would happen if someone somehow found it. The visions were disgusting as ever, and each time I saw them, they only strengthened my resolve to keep her safe. Sometimes they were only tiny snippets, like an image of her corpse or a dark forest, and other times, they were like entire movies in my head, but regardless of their form, they were always lurid enough to keep me going.

Weeks passed like that and one of the more unfortunate things I noticed was that my grades were slipping again; at the same time, I continued to get compliments on my skills back in my Reaper life, things like how I seemed to instinctively know things before I'd even learned them, how I was like a duck in water with a Death Scythe. But Laura was still thankfully good and well, and the visions were becoming more and more cryptic, to the point where they eventually faded away completely. So, slowly but surely, I ended up dropping my guard. Bad move.

It was a miserably cold day in November, and I was prepared for another regular, slow crawl at school, but when I showed up, I almost instantly noticed that Laura wasn't there. More specifically, I couldn't detect her soul's energy, a method which I had started making use of to track her—some part of my mind would sense her individual wavelengths, and it would tell me if she'd been in the area recently. Unfathomable as it was to me, I found it useful, and that was good enough.

Now, I wouldn't have thought much of it, but it was nearly 9:30, and she, unlike me, was virtually never late, so I was immediately worried. More so when I tried to call her and got no response. I stared at the screen, heartbeat picking up. No, she could've overslept, or maybe her car wouldn't start. That had to be it. That's what I told myself, but the denial I felt was so vicious that I knew it wasn't the case.

I trusted my instincts and quickly left in search of her, wasting no time on signing out at the office. I went back and forth through town, growing more panicked with each second as I realized I still couldn't find her. I looked practically everywhere, even teleporting onto rooftops to try and spot her from a distance, to no avail. I wasn't even sure if I had remembered to switch to invisibility, but at that point, I didn't care. Finding Laura was all that mattered.

That's when I felt a trace of energy down the road, so scarce I could've completely missed it just as easily. I stared for a moment, part of me still in disbelief, before quickly following it. Eventually, I ended up at an apartment in the middle of the downtown area. It wasn't until I noticed a sitting figure on the edge of the roof that I suddenly remembered this was also the tallest building in town, and that meant—

Shit.

I immediately headed up, and upon arriving, was met with the most absolutely dead-eyed look I'd ever seen, belonging to none other than Laura. If I could still get heart attacks, I would have.

"What are you doing here?" she slurred out.

"What am I doing here? What are _you_ doing here? You're on top of a six-storey fucking building in the middle of school!"

She said nothing, only slowly turned her gaze back to the cars zipping around below. Several minutes went by before she finally stood up. The sight alone was enough to trigger that dark sense of foreboding, and only then did I fully realize the gravity of the situation. If it was setting off my clairvoyance...

"I have a good reason," she eventually let out, fiddling weakly with her blouse.

"Damn it, Laura, just listen to me!" The fear I felt was so strong I could barely breathe, barely even speak, but I forced myself to continue. "Good reason or not, I can tell you that you're making a mistake. I've been there too, and I know this is going to sound like bullshit, but anything is better than what comes after. Please, please don't do it."

"How would you know?"

"It doesn't matter," I cried, inching closer to her. "Laura, I'm begging you. Get the fuck away from that ledge."

"Make me." Both heels were dangling so far over the drop that it made me sick to my stomach. It felt like she was going to fall any second.

Time manipulation. I tried to speed up, tried to make myself quick enough to just walk over and carry her back, but it wasn't working. Of fucking course. "Laura—Please! Please, please," I repeated, tears flooding my eyes in a sudden burst of emotion. Words couldn't describe my panic. "Laura, I deal with these kinds of thoughts every single day and I _understand._ We can talk about this. Just please, don't fucking do it!"

"It's too late," she murmured. "I'm sorry."

And she tipped right over the edge.

"No," I breathed, eyes widening. "No! Fucking—"

I warped after her, hoping to catch her in midair, but she was face-down on the ground before I knew it, her head making a horrifying sound as it hit the concrete. I crashed beside her with a yelp and immediately sat up, so quickly I nearly fell over again. The coppery scent was more overwhelming than I'd ever imagined it could be and the sight made me throw up in my mouth. This wasn't happening. This wasn't happening. This wasn't—

"Laura, wake up. Laura," I screamed, "Laura!"

It wasn't long before we were noticed, and there was a crowd around us within seconds. Shorter still was the time it took for an ambulance to materialize. A fucking ambulance. Did they think it was possible to save someone whose brain was spilled out? Someone who—oh, fuck. I couldn't feel her anywhere. Her soul was gone.

I lost it. I think I even blacked out for a bit, probably still hysterically crying.

"Young lady—young lady, are you okay?"

Fuck, I wasn't okay. I couldn't have been any further from okay. People I'd never met in my life were trying to talk me out of blaming myself, trying to convince me it wasn't my fault—didn't even know what the fuck had been going on for a month or why I needed so badly to keep her alive, and _yet,_ they still kept at it. Bastards.

I failed. Nothing could change that.

 **O O O**

"Marx!" I yelled, catching sight of him down the hall. "Stop, please. Have you seen a Laura Aldrich anywhere?"

"What? Why?"

"She's a friend, she just killed herself in front of my eyes. I'm seriously—I'm freaking out. Tell me where she is!"

He fell silent, as if taking in my sentence, before eventually answering, "If that's what happened, she might be in the garden. The one by the gates. Must be recent if no one else has been called down yet..."

"Thanks," I said, and immediately turned and bolted.

It was a straight shot from the doors, so I didn't have to worry about running into anything and managed to sprint the rest of the way, through the alleys, down the cobblestone path, and—

There she was.

She had on the most generic clothes I'd ever seen, just a matching set of grey shirt and shorts for the sake of covering her skin, and was sitting against the fountain, feet in the flowers and limy eyes filled with a dull gloom. A series of pale scars ran across the entire left side of her face, completely covering the one that had been on her eyebrow and stopping just below her jawline. Just looking at them made me want to cry.

"Laura," I slowly let out, walking over and sitting next to her. "Why didn't you listen?"

She blinked owlishly. "Johan? Is that you? I don't have my glasses yet."

"Tell me what happened. Please."

"What happened..." She drew a deep breath. "When I hit the ground, it felt like I blacked out for a split second, and when I woke up, I was in this place that was—it looked like outer space. I was standing naked on these blue checkered tiles that stretched out into infinity. You could see all the stars in the world reflected on them. It was beautiful. Then this man walked over. Everything about him was pitch-black, and his hair must've been ten times as long as mine," she exclaimed, pointing to the dark brown hair draped over her shoulders. "And his eyes..."

"His eyes?"

"They were just like yours, Johan. Bright green, almost glowing." Laura paused, staring blankly in front of her. She didn't even look conscious. "He told me he was Death. He was so sad. He asked why I did it, and I said I don't know."

"You were sick of the pain. That's why we're here, isn't it?" _That's why_ you're _here, at least,_ I thought grimly.

She nodded. "But you... All this time, when you were at school—it makes no sense. I don't understand."

"Sorry," I began, thankful she couldn't see the shame worming its way into my cheeks. "It's a long story. I really don't want to explain right now."

"Okay," she eventually sighed. "How long do I have to do this for?"

"It's different for everyone. It depends on things like how bad your life was, and how easy it would've been to change it, and how much would've been left for you if you didn't... if you didn't kill yourself. It could be anywhere from a couple hundred years to a thousand. Maybe more." _Did Marx tell me that?_

She choked out a sob at that. "Oh my God. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."

"It's alright." It wasn't. I felt horrible, disgusted with myself for not being able to stop her. I _failed,_ and I'd be forced to see the reminder every day when I walked through those doors and greeted her. "We'll get through this together."

It was a while before I managed to get up and lead her back into the building, where she received the same basic, round glasses that I had a few months ago. The clothes felt a little like a neon sign above her head, saying "Look at me! I just killed myself!" and nearly everyone we passed stopped to stare, but they thankfully didn't interfere any more than that. When Marx saw us, he immediately ran up, eyes wide.

"This is Laura?"

I gave a bleak nod.

Laura said nothing, only slowly reached over to shake his hand. I could tell he was trying hard not to look at the scar on her face.

"This must be so overwhelming, you—I can show you around if you'd like, to familiarize yourself with the place? Or maybe get you something to drink..."

She shook her head. "I'm not thirsty. Johan, do you wanna come?"

I stopped to think for a moment, before sighing and saying, "Sure. Lead the way, Marx."

 **O O O**

When I saw her the next day, Laura had on an all-black outfit consisting of a blazer, knee-length dress, and Mary Janes. She looked fit for a funeral.

She was placed in a small group of people who'd died in the past week. That is, her, a miserable-looking boy who didn't seem to have even started puberty yet, a pale man with a scruffy brown beard, and a young woman whose ears had more piercings than I could count—Alexander, Liam, and Dana. I was quick to notice that every one of them had a highly visible scar from their suicide; Laura, with the jagged lines that snaked over her face and left her with a small bald spot near her left ear, Alexander, with a similarly hairless bullet's exit hole on his right temple, Liam, with something that looked horribly like a tear on part of his neck from a too-high drop while hanging, and Dana, who had a series of pockmarks on her face which I imagined were from a shotgun or something of that sort. I looked away, nauseous.

"Okay, see that guy?" I said to Laura, trying to distract myself. "That's Elliot, our resident alcoholic and giant pain in the ass. Stay away from him."

"Um, alright."

"I heard that!" he yelled.

"Yeah, well, maybe if you didn't act like such a little shit all the time, I wouldn't have to warn people about you!" I shot back.

"Screw you!"

"Screw _you!_ "

"Johan, stop," Laura cut in. "Just leave him."

"Ugh." My eyes narrowed slightly. "I'm hoping you got my drift."

Just then, Dana walked over, asking, "Laura, you coming?"

"I... Yeah. Johan, I have to go now."

"Wait," I said, a hand on her shoulder. "Listen, I know things are pretty bad right now, but you'll be okay. We _will_ get through this together. Don't forget that."

She smiled weakly. "I won't."

 **O O O**

Laura's funeral was held the week after, in the cemetery's outskirts. I personally found it strange to want to witness your own burial, but I could see the appeal. We went together and huddled near the edge of the small crowd gathered around her coffin, which had been covered in tiny flowers and stained a beautiful deep purple. Her favourite colour, she'd once told me in a flurry of late-night texts. Everything was a cruel reminder of what had gone down, what I had the power to stop, but even then, I couldn't tear my eyes away from it all, with some masochistic part of me relishing the guilt it brought. Or maybe that was the depression speaking. It didn't matter.

"They can't see us?" Laura half-asked.

"Nope. Not you, at least," I added. "I'm not really sure what it is about humans, but they have a really hard time detecting the supernatural. Then you have little kids and other animals who can see all kinds of things, like ghosts, and demons, and fairies... Maybe it's a logic and reasoning thing? They just convince themselves that we don't exist, to the point where they can't see us. Almost like hysterical blindness in a way."

"Maybe." She paused. "But wait, they can see you?"

"Yeah, you can make it so that you're more visible, and vice versa. It, uh... takes a while to figure out."

She nodded. "What about people who are close to death?"

"Definitely. Whether it's that person who's going to die soon, or if they just hang around others like that a lot, like if they work in a hospital, that definitely makes them more perceptive too."

I thought I saw her eyebrows raise at that, but even if I had, they were down just as quickly.

We walked around for a bit, looking to see who had come and sneaking food off tables. Things quieted down after a while and I heard the minister start speaking. Generic stuff like how this person was taken from us too early, how she would hopefully find peace in Heaven, et cetera, et cetera. He had an obnoxiously cheery way of saying it all that just made me feel even worse, and I wanted badly to leave, but Laura seemed to want me to stay with her, so I tried not to let it overcome me.

"All of these people," she slowly let out, as we listened to eulogies. "Why..."

I glanced at her, a weak smile on my face. "Don't you understand? You were never unloved."

The next voice was loud enough to be heard from where we were: "Laura, thanks for being my friend in kindergarten."

"Oh, that's—Thomas!" Her eyes widened, and she immediately ran, stopping in front of a lanky, blond boy clutching a single yellow rose; I quickly followed. "Jesus, we haven't talked in years," she murmured, voice shaking. "I didn't even remember him until now."

I didn't say anything.

It wasn't long before the whole funeral part was over, and we were trailing awkwardly behind the pallbearers, me still a nervous wreck, and Laura still a bizarrely interested ball of wonder. Where had all that gloom from last week gone? I was so out of it that I barely even felt my legs moving, like I was completely weightless, and I expected to just fall over at some point, but it never happened. The burial itself was as much a blur as the trip. All that really stuck with me was the smell of fresh soil over the grave.

Laura headed back to the Grim dimension after I showed her the way, confessing to me in front of the gate that she wasn't even Catholic enough for the kind of funeral she'd just had, and I laughed. I laughed until I cried. I wasn't particularly religious myself, only believing in little snippets of things like an afterlife and souls (both a no-brainer at this point), never really conforming to anything. So we both liked purple and we both weren't much for organized religion. At least we had more in common than just an embarrassing amount of cynicism injected into our personalities.

I sat there for a while, curled up in the now wilting dandelions in front of the gate. Maybe part of me expected someone to show up, tell me something I wanted to hear. That I really couldn't have prevented Laura's death and it wasn't my fault, that I was going to live to reach the light at the end of the tunnel, that—hell, I don't know, that William, who had never even spoken to me before, didn't even know who I was, secretly harboured some sort of attraction for me. Probably not. I sighed and got up, and awkwardly dropped into my third period class, with no pencils, no books, no nothing. I couldn't find it in me to care.

"Sorry I'm late," I muttered, closing the door behind me and collapsing into an empty seat. "I was at a funeral."

"Wow, I never would have been able to tell!" someone called out. I guess they were referring to my suit, which I hadn't bothered changing out of before coming.

"It was my best friend, asshole. Maybe take a moment to stop being such an insensitive fuck before saying something, huh?"

That shut them up.

That day, we were working on—of _all_ things, human biology. I was more than a little sick of it by now, and then there was the fact that I had already completely memorized everything weeks earlier, a _nd_ the fact that Grim Reapers were apparently much more knowledgeable on the topic, even more than the few dozen scientists who'd written the books. Anyway, it took a lot out of me to not walk up and slap my teacher for teaching inaccurate info.

I got bored halfway through and semi-stealthily messed around with my abilities for the remainder of class, trying to get the whole time manipulation thing to work. I managed to speed myself up enough to keep a pencil in the air for a few seconds, but that was it. No way would it be enough to prevent a suicide.

The bell rang and I was getting ready to leave when I was suddenly stopped. David 'Cunty' McFuckwit, once again.

"What do you want?"

"You pushed her, didn't you?"

"What? What the hell are you talking about?"

"Laura, that Grade 10 kid who died last week—you _pushed_ her, didn't you? Fucking creep. First you go reading about souls in class and now—"

I grabbed him by the collar and pulled him towards me. "Listen. I don't know what you've heard, but I didn't push her. You know what I did? I tried to _save_ her. I tried to keep her from jumping. The paramedics had to give me an Ativan, that's how hysterical I was after I failed. I blame myself for her death _every single day;_ since last week, my parents have never seen me more depressed in my life. And you think I fucking _pushed_ her?"

He didn't say anything.

"You really are deserving of your name," I growled, releasing him.

I was gone before he could follow me.

 **O O O**

"... and each Grim Reaper has access to their own personal pocket dimension, used for storage of items such as Death Scythes, assignments, and anything else as desired. There's not much of a limit as far as space is concerned, but generally, only what you can lift by yourself can be placed. So no tossing in bulldozers or something," Marx finished, chuckling.

I raised my hand.

"Johan?"

"What about humans?"

"Um, I'm... not really sure. Maybe just don't try to kidnap people?"

I sighed and muttered an "Okay."

"Then, that wraps up today's lessons. I'll see you all tomorrow."

Elliot was still in his favourite chair after everyone left, messing around on his phone. I sauntered over, eyebrow raised slightly. "So, uh... I hear you're in charge of a pretty big group of deaths happening soon."

"Yep." He didn't look up.

"Sounds intense."

"Very."

"Shouldn't you be getting ready for that?"

"Yeah, gimme a second," he said, still tapping away at his phone. "I'm a little busy at the moment."

A second passed. Then another. And then he received an image, and my face flew into fifty shades of red almost instantly. He just grinned.

"Elliot, for _fuck's_ sake. Stop sexting and go do something actually productive, will you?"

He put up a middle finger in front of his face and continued typing with his other hand. I just sighed and left.

Was I ever glad I had a winter coat over my suit, because when I got home, my parents were waiting in the living room. I put my things on the counter and turned to look at them again.

 _"What's going on?"_ I asked in Bulgarian.

Dad cleared his throat nervously. _"How have you been feeling lately?"_

 _"What? Um, I don't know, okay? Why?"_

 _"How would you feel about seeing a therapist?"_ Mom.

I blinked. Oh boy. See, if I was just another teenager, therapy would probably work great—but no, I was a mythical death god, switched at birth and somehow dragged into a mythical death god school, and dealing with the weight of knowing when everyone I loved was going to die. How does a regular, human therapist help you with that?

I agreed anyway.

 _"I'll ask tomorrow about getting you someone,"_ Dad said. _"Though it might take a while to get everything set up."_

I nodded, and grabbed my bag and headed to my room, where I spent the rest of the evening going over the packet of funeral etiquette I'd printed off shortly after Laura's death. I figured I'd have to memorize it sooner or later.

 **O O O**

Another several weeks passed and before I knew it, I had a fast-approaching date for an appointment. That and it was Christmas. I wasn't sure why I came in that day, when I could've just stayed home and slept in to little consequence. Maybe it was boredom. In any case, it was a good thing I did, because when Marx showed up, he was carrying a thick black turtleneck that he said was for me.

"How'd you know I'd like this?"

He shrugged. "I didn't. Lucky guess. You're size small, right?"

"Yeah," I answered, slipping off my jacket for a moment to put the sweater on underneath. I glanced down and grinned. "Jeez, I forgot to get you something."

"Don't sweat it. Oh, and Allison brought cookies. A _lot_ of cookies." He pointed to where she was standing, talking with several others and holding an open box full of cookies—chocolate chip, gingerbread, and sugar, upon closer inspection.

"I didn't know you baked," I said, grabbing a gingerbread.

She shrugged. "It's a hobby."

"And they're still warm." I took a bite. "Are these fresh?"

"Yep! I made the dough yesterday and baked them just this morning. And hardly anyone's had any yet, so you can still get the best ones." She gave a grin.

"Hardly anyone..." My eyes widened slightly. "I can have more than one, right?"

"Mhm."

I rushed over to the tableware cabinet and grabbed a plate, along with one cookie of each kind. "Thank you!" I yelled, and headed off down the hall.

Nameplates, nameplates, nameplates. I eyed each door closely as I passed it, until I found what I was looking for. I glanced down at the plate and my hands, then back up. Deep breaths. I knocked.

A moment passed before the door opened, and William popped his head out, admittedly looking a little annoyed, I guess that I'd dragged him out of whatever he was doing just then.

"Um... M-merry Christmas," I let out, smiling weakly.

Part of me was expecting another awkward silence, like the kind I triggered every eight out of ten times I talked to someone, or even a door-slam-in-the-face, but neither came. "Thank you," he said, taking the plate. There was a pause. "What's your name?"

"J-Johannes. Though most people just shorten it..."

"It's nice to meet you, Johannes. Merry Christmas."


	5. And I Must Scream

"Your parents are very concerned."

"Mhm."

Dr. Morrison took another long, thoughtful look at his notes. They were completely blank, save for my cynical, semi-sarcastic responses to the generic questions he asked at the beginning of the session. Messy scrawls in a psychologist's tongue, the kind of obnoxiously clinical words that did nothing but incite an inwards cringe—if you could even figure out the chicken scratch quick enough before they noticed you peeking. "What's up?"

"Long story. Can't really share." _You wouldn't believe me, anyway._

"Why?"

I shrugged.

"Is it something bad?"

"How do you define _bad_?"

That made him recoil, like my question only made it even more likely that there was something very wrong going on. Learn to take a fucking joke, I would've liked to say, but I only rolled my eyes and sank deeper into my chair, waiting for him to speak.

"Well, I don't know," he eventually said. "Home abuse. Witnessing a death"—I tensed slightly at that—"or struggling with a relationship. Is it any of those?"

I thought about it for a minute, and then told him, "My friend killed herself recently." It certainly wasn't a lie, but there was too much I wasn't including—like the part about me foreseeing her death and suffering continual, excruciating guilt as a result of being unable to prevent it.

He shifted slightly in his seat, gave a look like he was trying to think of what to say.

"Yeah," I muttered. "I, um, I tried to stop her. Failed miserably..."

"Okay, let's step back for a moment. What was your friend like?"

"Her name's Laura, she's sixteen, she—" I stopped. "She... Well, she was," I corrected, faking a grimace. "She was really good at school, and we... liked the same colours, a lot of the same music. We were really into classical."

"Mm. Do you ever feel like her death was your fault?"

" _Yes,_ " I said. "Yes. All the time. Like I said, I tried to stop her. I was up there on the roof when she jumped."

"She jumped," he repeated, nodding absentmindedly. "Why were you on the roof?"

"I—" I what? Stalked her for half an hour by means of supernatural soul-detecting abilities, stalked her for nearly a month prior in order to even figure out her unique wavelengths in the first place? "I, um... I was running an errand nearby and I saw her, so I went up. That's it. And I wasn't planning on killing myself too, if that's what you're asking."

"No, not at all." He glanced at the clock. Most of the appointment had been wasted just trying in vain to learn my interests, so it came as no surprise that we were already way over. A moment passed and he opened his mouth, furrowed his brows again the way he did when he was trying to think of something to say. "Maybe we should work on that guilt of yours?"

 _Don't you fucking talk to me about guilt._ "No. I'm fine. Can I go now?"

He looked like he was about to protest, but then nodded, and I got up. A pamphlet on grief management was forced into my hands before I could leave, to which I almost—very, very seriously almost—responded by shoving it down his throat.

"And you're _sure_ you weren't planning on killing yourself too?"

I slammed the door behind me.

 **O O O**

"So what do you do these days?" I asked, handing William a stack of papers he'd asked me to bring.

"I help investigate and prevent abnormal deaths," he answered, not looking up.

"Like forensics?"

"Something like that."

"Oh."

Unless there was some secret, unlisted subdivision somewhere that I didn't know about, I wasn't sure what else dealt with such affairs, or why he'd leave his answer vague. But William—almost by nature—wasn't very keen on disclosing information, especially to people he didn't know well, so I decided not to probe. If he felt like elaborating, he'd do it in his own time, I figured.

There was still some time before my afternoon class, and I had nothing better to do, so I went down to the lounge and sat down with a cup of plain coffee and my sketchbook. Ten minutes later I had another picture of a possible future self, an abstract creature of some sort, and—just for the heck of it—Elliot with clip-on sunglasses and his hair in pigtails. He looked unexpectedly badass like that, but I still decided to play it safe and keep the drawing a secret for now.

I tucked the sketchbook back into my bag and headed to class.

Marx was out on an unfortunately timed assignment, leaving Elliot in charge. To be completely honest, I didn't even expect him to show up, but he did, and—praise the heavens above—he wasn't any form of drunk. Given his uncomfortably high tendency towards violence when sober, most of us were prepared to spend the hour cowering in the corner, but he seemed pretty chill that day, and it turned out he made a surprisingly good teacher when he didn't have anyone else to do it for him. What a relief.

We picked up where we left off yesterday, which was quite a detailed explanation on how to reap the souls of folk that have been trapped somewhere—under a pile of rubble or some other tight space, for example. It was an interesting enough topic, but my poor focus decided to wreak havoc on me once more, and I couldn't recite a single thing from that day if my life depended on it. Mostly I just nodded and hoped to hell and back that I didn't get stuck with such an assignment.

About the only thing I managed to keep in was that flames can't burn Grim Reapers; although the high temperature was still obvious, no pain or injury occurred if you came into contact with them, nor did anything on you catch fire. I thought about taking a bath later to see what it was like.

I was getting ready to leave when Elliot stopped me.

"Yeah?"

"Listen, kid. There's something I want to talk to you about. Could you come with me for a bit?"

"Eh? Where?" I glanced behind me. Everyone else had already left.

"There's a bakery I need t'pick some things up from. Thought it'd be a nice opportunity for a conversation."

"This isn't a trick to get me in a vulnerable position so you can do something nasty to me?"

"If it makes you feel better, I'll stay visible." He snapped his fingers and his presence seemed to shift slightly. _Does that make it easier for him to activate certain abilities? Huh._

I weighed my options and decided to go along.

I hadn't taken the time to memorize where all the gates led to—besides the one to my own town, and the one to HQ—but I did know that the reason we had more than usual in the vicinity was because the base was shared by several small districts for practical reasons. They were mostly towns and villages close to the upper corner of the US/Canada border, places with too little inhabitants to warrant a settlement of their own. In fact, few Reapers I knew actually had anything to do with my hometown, besides Marx and Laura. Talk about lonely.

I peered into the gate. "Vaguely familiar scenery. Possibly read about in a book somewhere."

"Like what? An Alaskan travel guide?" He snorted.

"Yeah, probably," I said, after a glance at the sign on one end of the arch showed the common name for the location, stamped above a long string of coordinates—Juneau.

The other side of the gate was hidden in an old, crumbling house, accessible through what would otherwise be the entrance to an empty room. The windows were boarded up and covered in graffiti, and between the sloppy tags and amateur drawings, only one thing really stuck out—"... and not even Death would permit an end to my suffering..." above a pair of closed eyes, all done in a familiar, neon green. It was tiny, barely noticeable from a distance, and to the average person, it wouldn't mean much, but I wasn't an average person. Neither was Elliot; I saw him glance pityingly at the words before heading off. I followed.

"So you work here, or?"

"Nah, I'm over in the town next door, but I spend a lot of my free time here. It's nice."

"Mm." I laughed inwardly, remembering a time when my parents had wanted to go on a trip with me to this same city, only to be forced into cancelling it at the last minute as a result of a seven-year-old's irrational fear of ferries. In retrospect, it was a bit ironic, considering that—maybe not for said seven-year-old's yet unawakened self—breathing every three seconds was no longer on my list of basic requirements, and so for a simple underwater stroll to harm me was virtually impossible, as long as I didn't let any water into my lungs. Now, that wouldn't feel pleasant no matter what you were.

The door sounded a chime.

The lingering scent of cinnamon inside the bakery was incredible, and not just because it was good. Here was something I hadn't thought about since September: every one of my other enhanced senses had all been figured out days later, but with little smells surrounding me around that time other than the ones I was too used to to notice an increase in strength, there was never an opportunity to see what that fifth sense could do.

"Goodness, if it weren't for the hair, I'd hardly be able to tell you two apart," I heard the girl at the front remark, and I gave a shaky, awkward smile. That was clearly an exaggeration, but I got what she meant. She was referring to our identically green, bespectacled eyes.

"He's my half-brother," Elliot said, without missing a beat.

"Ah, no wonder. The usual?"

He shrugged and asked me, "Y'want anything?"

"Oh, um... Maybe an apple turnover?" I said after a few moments of looking.

She picked one out and placed it in a little cardboard box, which I kept with me. Elliot took everything else in a reusable bag and paid, and we left. We stopped at a small park, empty save for several large, snow-covered trees. I sat in an old bench with my knees up against my chest; Elliot remained standing a few feet away from me, leaned against a chain link fence.

He set his bag of breads to the side and pulled out a cigarette and lighter. "So," he began, tapping a flame to the end, "what made you choose this path?"

The faint flicker of his eyes as he finished the sentence was timed well enough that I didn't have to ask about said path, but—"Choose it?"

He tilted his head slightly. "You know what I mean, Johan."

"Oh. _Oh._ That. Um, I... I don't know."

"Seemed fun?"

"N-no. It was... Marx said it would help me figure out my powers and stuff."

"And?"

I groaned. " _And_ I wanted a magical almighty killing tool. Fucking sue me, blondie."

His expression changed somewhat. "Anyone in particular you'd use it on?"

"Eh? Um, no," I said, shaking my head. "Not outside of my daydreams."

"That's good."

A long, dreadful silence settled between us; even the cars stopped passing by. Elliot was on his second cigarette and I was halfway through the turnover he'd gotten for me when he furrowed his brows, gave a sudden huff.

"You okay?" I ventured, looking up.

"Christ, it's just—Marx, he's too heroic for his own good," he growled, tossing the burnt cigarette into the snow, where it sizzled for a moment before dying down. "That's what he thinks he is, going around tryin' to save everyone, but he's nothing but an arrogant, misguided brat. Yeah, I know what you're gonna say, but come on, kid, I've known him for at least several decades, and you? Please."

I didn't say anything.

"Think, Johan. Are you really better off as a Grim Reaper?"

Sober Elliot could be dangerous, but when he wasn't caught in a violent fit, he was also undeniably cool and logical in his thoughts and actions, even if they were a little blunt sometimes. As much as I hated to admit it, he was right. Was I really doing myself a favour in working as a Reaper? Was it too late to just... quit?

"No," I finally answered. "No, I'm not. But no matter what I chose that day, it wouldn't have been good. If I didn't join, I would've just slowly died from the inside out under all my shit-tonnes of mental illnesses and eventually gotten someone to finish the job, probably a demon since I had no ties to any Reapers who would gladly do it for me. And if I never awoke in the first place? I'd be here anyway. It was a catch-22. I _hated_ having to choose."

He nodded in—understanding? Huh. "Mental illness is bad enough as a mortal. I can't imagine having to deal with that for all eternity. Most of mine left during the whole rebirth process, thankfully." He paused. "You... Oh, bloody—that never happened to you?"

I shook my head, mouth turned in a painful frown. "I guess because I never really went through a rebirth. It might have lessened a bit, but as far as I can tell, it's all still there." I rubbed my eyes. "What did you suffer from?"

"Depression. Anxiety. The usual." He shrugged. "I got paranoid really easily, and I still do, but it's a lot better now."

"Mm."

"Johan, you've still got the other powers that come with being a Reaper, right?"

"Yeah, of course."

"Use them. Get stronger. Maybe one day you'll break through on your own." He smiled bitterly.

It was almost funny. Knowing him, he'd probably be right back to treating me like trash by the next day, and yet...

"Yeah, maybe," I muttered. "Elliot... this is gonna sound weird, but being stuck like this, with suicide pretty much impossible... somehow, it's encouraging. It's a way of saying that I can't just take the easy way out this time. That I have to try." I paused, glancing back at him with a smile of my own just as I created a portal for home in front of me. "And that's what I'm going to do."

 **O O O**

"... but we're only in charge of an incredibly small part of souls, when you think about it," Marx was saying. "Other worlds, other dimensions even, they work in different ways. Some have their own version of a Grim Reaper, and in others, the souls just leave on their own once the vessel dies, with no need for someone to help sever their tie to life, or guide them. It's strange to think about. Anyway..."

Cinematic Records were what you saw when your life flashed before your eyes; a long, seemingly infinite film strip of all your memories, all your thoughts, all your feelings—everything. They were fluid, and some stories even told of others tampering with them, but to a skilled Reaper, it was usually obvious which parts weren't genuine.

Using their Death Scythe, a Grim Reaper pulls up the person's Record and after closely inspecting it, which can take anywhere from a minute to an hour from their point of view, they must decide whether that person should live or die, and act accordingly—by either continuing the soul collection process, or returning the Cinematic Record to the body and hoping that someone will assist the person before the situation repeats itself. But allowing someone to continue living, as Marx continually stressed, is more the exception than the rule, and unless their continued existence would directly benefit others, you don't have much of a say in the matter.

True death, without a Grim Reaper to sever a person's tie between their soul and body, is rare, and that's often what's happened when you hear about people getting revived after being clinically dead for a time. Leave a soul in a dead body for too long, however, and it tends to exit on its own, and without a guide to the afterlife, what that usually means for those unfortunate few is remaining a ghost for however long it takes for someone to notice.

The lesson ended at that and I packed up and left, only stopping to grab a coffee to-go from the lounge.

I was a street away from my house when a boy shovelling snow nearby suddenly caught my attention, triggering my death clairvoyance in a way I'd never felt before.

I flipped into invisibility and went closer. He had light skin and platinum hair, and unbelievably dark eyes. There was a refreshingly unconventional beauty about him that just pulled me in, to the point that I forgot to watch where I was going and tripped, falling right onto him. That was when I finally saw something; this strange, gorgeous boy exiting a shop, plastic bag in hand, only to get knocked unconscious and wake up in an empty building—a warehouse? And then... and then a figure walking up to him with a blade, maybe a knife. I couldn't tell. And then nothing.

I realized I was still on top of him and quickly jumped off, hoping the invisible weight on his back hadn't freaked him out too much. I guess the fall itself had distracted him enough that he didn't notice, and I heard him mutter something about clumsiness before he went back to shovelling snow. I exhaled a breath I didn't even know I was holding and glanced back at my coffee, which was miraculously still intact. Thank God. No way could he come up with a logical explanation for a spill suddenly materializing next to him.

The more I watched him, the more I felt like something was very, very wrong. I had to know more.

The whole stalking thing was becoming a nasty habit of mine, but I figured now wasn't the time to work on breaking it. I woke up early next morning and followed his energy to the college, under a mask of invisibility. After figuring out what that first class was, I snuck into the office while the secretary was out and quickly set to work. Her computer was open to the student files and the session thankfully hadn't timed out yet. I pulled up the class information and found the list of enrolled students, and went through each of the names, opening their detailed files in a new tab, until I came across someone named James Schmidt. I knew it was him before I even saw the photo.

I repeated the name in my head as I drew up a portal and headed back, off to the small computer lab that I'd seen once during my tour with Laura.

I grabbed an empty seat and fired up the machine. Like everything else the Reapers used, it was high-tech and futuristic, but not unnecessarily so—like my phone. It was still easy to tell what was what. Bringing up a holographic keyboard on the desk, I opened up the archives and started looking. James Schmidt. I hit enter and was immediately met with at least a thousand, maybe more, results. Too vague. I typed in the country, and the results shrank to about a hundred. I thought for a moment, brows furrowed slightly. Age? I couldn't remember. I started going backwards from 1998, checking each year for anything relevant. I eventually came to 1994, and the single result on the page was coupled with an unmistakable picture of his face.

I opened it up and almost choked.

He wasn't supposed to die until _2067._

God, no wonder this felt different. An unlisted death could only mean one of two things: either it was a suicide, or a demon had stepped in and taken the soul before the body was ready, screwing up the natural progression of things. It couldn't possibly be the former; the vision showed someone else with him. But who?

I stood up and left, nauseous.

Thoughts of him kept me up that night. I had to figure this out. I had to.

 **O O O**

Early the next morning—as early as I could get out of school with a reasonable excuse—I made my way to the other world, desperate for information. There was only one person I knew so far who might have any idea what was going on; the question was, would he be willing to help?

I took a deep breath and knocked, one-two-three in quick succession. Nothing.

Maybe it wasn't worth it. I didn't even know James.

No. No, of course it was. I was a mystery nerd already, and if solving this mystery meant preventing an untimely death—

I knocked again. And again. I was one more attempt from giving up when the door opened.

William looked like he was close to having a fit, speaking far too carefully as he said, "I'm busy, Johannes. Would you mind saving this for another time?"

Would I?

"Yeah. Yeah, I would, actually." He frowned slightly. "S-s-sorry, it's just... y-you deal with abnormal deaths, right? I need to ask you something."

He was silent for the longest time, before eventually sighing and saying, "Alright. Come in. And make it quick," he finished under his breath.

It was a small, quaint place, with a few bookshelves lining the walls, and a desk and metal chair at the far end, right in front of a big window. A series of dated boxes filled one corner of the room; aside from the one marked _December 2015,_ they were all unopened. I wondered what had happened in December.

William took a seat at his desk and asked, "What did you want to discuss?"

"Okay... Okay." I took a deep breath. "There's this kid, James Schmidt. He lives in my town and he set off my death clairvoyance really bad last night. _Really bad._ And, um... I checked his files and it turns out—they say he's not supposed to die until 2067. But that's false. I can feel it. He doesn't have more than one, maybe two weeks."

"Two weeks?" He raised an eyebrow. "It's rare to be able to see that far into someone's future. The most I've heard of is a few days, and even then, it only works with written death dates."

"Marx told my powers are stronger than most. And I have to be near that person a lot, like if they're a student at my—" I cut off, realizing what I'd just said. "Like... like if w-w-we were both students at a school..."

He sighed. "I already know about you."

"What?"

"I already know about you," he repeated, his tone just as flat as the first time. "I know you didn't commit suicide, Johannes. You don't have to hide it."

"Oh, um..." I felt my face grow hot. "Okay."

"Now, this James—what do you know about him?"

I took a deep breath. "He gets murdered. But I couldn't figure out who it is or where it happens, and I couldn't hear anything like I sometimes do. They're usually so detailed," I muttered. "What a stupid time to be all cryptic and—"

"What did the weapon look like?"

"Um... I think it was a knife. I couldn't really tell."

"And their hands? Were they visible?"

"Their hands?" My brows furrowed. "No, they had gloves on."

He muttered something under his breath and then said, "Alright, thank you. I'll see what I can do."

I wanted to stay and ask more, but William had work to do and it wouldn't be long before someone noticed I wasn't in school, so I headed back.

Classes were an anxious blur as always, and other than the surprisingly good food at the cafeteria and a student from another grade asking if I was in a cult, there were no unusual occurrences. Reaper work was more practical stuff—how to properly reap a soul and how to fight with a Death Scythe if the situation arose. I accidentally smashed a hole in the wall with a foam sword and then hid it behind a chair. No one noticed.

William didn't have anything particularly urgent just then, so I went and tried to get some more information out of him, but he didn't have much more I didn't already know. Most of what was left was applying the knowledge to the real world to try and reach a solution.

With nothing left to do, I headed home and went to bed.

Four hours passed.

I realized I was still awake and sat up.

Let it be known that manoeuvring through a second-storey window and running off downtown in the middle of the night is not something I would've done if it weren't for the safety net of my powers. I was an extraordinarily anxious person by nature, and not even the frequent wanderlust I experienced could bring me into the face of danger—but with death a near impossibility and the ability to teleport away if the situation called for it, it was hardly worth worrying.

Unable to sleep and with James's demise drawing closer and closer by the second, I decided to see what I could find out, and the location of the warehouse was where I started.

After finding my shoes and a coat, I opened the window and took off the screen. There was a fence a few feet from that side of the house; with a good enough eye for distance, and given my increased strength and speed, I could probably break up the jump and then land in the neighbour's yard. Another option was to teleport down, but I hadn't practiced much, and a lack of sleep was apparently killer when it came to those powers. I tried anyway, and successfully appeared in front of the house.

I still couldn't believe I was doing this.

Nevertheless, I headed downtown and got to work, making sure I was undetectable. The eerie quiet and the fact that I was completely alone was the strangest sensation I'd ever felt, and it took a lot to keep it from getting to me. Very few of the buildings I tried had lights on inside, and although I had more than adequate night vision, it was horribly unnerving to walk around in the darkness. I nearly set off an alarm at one point after a noise made me jump.

Several hours passed and I'd checked even the most remotely suspicious buildings when I finally realized something: James couldn't possibly die in this town. There wasn't a single place that matched the warehouse in my vision. If he didn't die here, where _did_ he die? Edmonton, Brussels, fucking _Tokyo?_ If a supernatural entity was at the bottom of this, everything was fair game.

Damn it.

I was drained and way too frustrated to continue, so I quickly headed home and rested as best I could before the day began.

Even after that disheartening turn of events, I was still deeply interested in James and trying to figure out what the hell was going on. and every second counted. If I wanted something to change, I had to figure something out soon, and with where this was going, I needed all the time I could get.

So I skipped.

That was concerning not because I cared about skipping school, but because there wasn't a single explanation I could give to either my parents or my teachers that would be believed. I was a poor liar and the idea that an otherwise normal student, normal young adult, could be absent because they were investigating a series of mysterious, highly supernatural deaths was blasphemous; I was magnificently and inescapably fucked.

Unless. Unless I—can you guess? Unless I fucking snuck into my dad's office and blocked the school number on his phone, so he couldn't be alerted of my absence. Was this getting out of hand? Yep. Did I plan on fixing it anytime soon? Hardly.

I kept at it for a whole three days, sniffing out whatever I could whenever I could. Figuring out the future crime scene was definitely out of the question, but tracking down the killer was still an option.

I tried triggering another vision, tried to see if I could get a clearer shot of the person; tried asking other Reapers if they'd seen anyone odd lately; even tried following James for a while to see if anyone showed up. Nothing worked. I wanted to scream.

It was walking home that third day that I saw someone up on the roof of a house _._

"The view's really nice from here," he called when he noticed my stare. "You should try it!"

"'Try it?' Shit, how'd you even get up there?"

"I jumped," he answered, a matter-of-fact grin on his face. "Can't you just teleport?"

Something about the way he said it told me that he already knew what I was capable of, so I didn't try to hide and warped next to him. He was a petite, dark-skinned boy with long, braided hair, and one green and one blue eye, whose name I learned was Esteban. There was a strange charm about him, an energy that sent shivers down my spine. Empathy was telling me that he was a kind, gentle person, and yet...

"You're a demon," I said flatly.

"Took you long enough." He was picking at his silvery nail polish, revealing characteristic black claws underneath. "My permanent home's around here, but I was up in Alaska for a few years—um, 'few years' in my case meaning several decades, I should probably clarify. Now I'm back. Thought I'd say hello."

"Um... but I'm..."

"Doesn't matter. Besides, I can already tell you're not part of the majority. I'm not either." He took a meaningful pause before leaning in and continuing, "So! Wanna be friends?"

"I guess?" I chuckled awkwardly.

"Oh—you're only the second Reaper that's ever said yes!"

A small part of me wanted to ask who the first was, but I had more important things on my mind. Whoever Esteban was, there was a large chance he'd know something that could help me, help prevent James's death. I had to see.

I gave a short farewell and headed home.

 **O O O**

Several days passed.

I learned about heart illnesses, and what happens during a cardiac arrest. Later, I tried and failed to ignore the misleading information in a health pamphlet that I noticed in the school library that day, by means of another odd coincidence. Risk factors—of which several weren't real, and many more weren't even included.

It was strange to sit so far above modern medical research. Strange to think that the very things I used to believe in were mostly false concepts made popular by a group of humans who just didn't know better. It took a hundred years for the cigarette's dangers to be discovered; how long would it take for all these?

There was still no news on James, and I had a scheduled appointment with Dr. Morrison. I spent a long forty minutes explaining to my parents how I didn't feel he was a good match for me, how I wasn't comfortable sharing my problems with him. That thankfully worked, and by the next week or so, I was supposed to have someone new. I hoped I could share what was actually going on, but I knew I was just setting myself up for disappointment.

I spent that next hour talking to Esteban, and I eventually worked up the courage to ask, "Do you know someone named, uh, James Schmidt?"

"I don't think so. What does he look like?"

"Pale, kinda, blond hair, brown eyes."

"Mm... Nope, sorry. Why?"

I cleared my throat. "You know—you know how Reapers can foretell deaths?"

"Yeah, premonitions and stuff." Esteban paused, took a sip from what looked like a fruit smoothie. "His date's soon?"

"Yes—I mean... no? It's, um—the archives say he isn't supposed to die for years, but that's not the case. I got a vision of him during what I'm pretty sure is going to be a murder—creepy figure with a knife and everything. And it's just..." I shook my head. "It can't be another human."

"You think I'm gonna kill him?"

"What? No, no. But maybe you'd know something that could help, like if there's a suspicious acquaintance you have. You wouldn't do something like this."

A long minute passed before he sighed and said, "I'm sorry. I really can't help."

"Oh." I tried not to let the disappointment show on my face. "I see. Thanks anyway."

I said goodbye and left.

 **O O O**

"How do you catch a murderer?"

 _"Well, we look at evidence, you know—bits of clothing from the crime scene, last seens, stuff like that. Line up the suspects and question them, see if we can get some information."_

"What if the murder hasn't been committed yet?"

 _"Excuse me?_ "

"What if the murder hasn't been committed yet? What if you know it's going to happen soon, but you don't know who's behind it?"

The line went silent. I sighed and hung up.

 **O O O**

James passed away the next morning.

I felt it in the middle of class, knew it had finally happened when that familiar wave of melancholy washed over me. Sharp. Instant. I had to bite my tongue just to keep from crying. It was sickening to think that even after all I'd done, he'd still suffered an early demise—so sickening, in fact, that I had to immediately head to the office to fake a call home and leave. I couldn't take it. I needed a release.

I found where he was knocked unconscious and sat down. I didn't know James well enough to be sad; all I felt in that moment was raw anger. Anger at my own inability to prevent a single death. I refused to accept it.

Several minutes passed.

"Hey, Johan."

A small part of me expected Marx, but when I looked up, it was Esteban standing there. "Hey."

"Something wrong? You seem kinda..."

"James is dead."

"Oh—you couldn't stop it? God, I'm sorry. I..."

"Why do you care? Demons can't feel these kinds of emotions."

"They can't. But... I once heard from someone that I have a little human in me. That's why I can feel things like sadness and love." He stopped. "When did James die?"

"When? Shit, I dunno—like, an hour ago, give or take."

"And it wasn't another human?"

"It couldn't have been."

He took a deep breath. "I saw someone today. They had death on them."

"They—what? When was that?"

"Forty minutes ago."

"Forty? Oh, man, you're saying—"

"I don't know how helpful this is, but whoever it was didn't want the soul. I was passing by and the next thing I knew, it was in my pocket—you know, those gems, trinkets, whatever, you occasionally hear about people messing around with spells and putting parts of their souls inside in case they need some emergency energy."

"What, like a Horcrux?"

"Yeah, a little." He paused. "You ever heard of demon black markets?"

"I... No, but I can imagine," I said, a bitter frown on my face. "Take someone's soul and preserve it in something and try to get something out of it."

"Yeah. Why this guy would give away an entire soul for free, though, I'm not sure, unless—"

"Unless?"

"Sometimes demons will send souls to others. Friends, people they're indebted to..."

"So it was a demon who killed him?"

He didn't answer. "Johan, I'm sorry."

"Wha—sorry? For what?"

"I ate it. I should've given it to you. The soul."

A long minute passed in silence before I spoke. "It's okay. You don't really have a choice."

He closed his eyes for a moment. "Most demons are too strong for this to happen to them, but... I had a friend who never ate, and eventually, she just lost herself. Turned vicious, wild. Didn't even recognize me. She tore her own soul apart. I never learned what happened to her after that..."

The change of topic was a little sudden, but I still asked, "How did she tear it apart?"

"Eh? Thought you'd know something like this. But you are pretty new, so I'll forgive you. Basically, her energy became so unstable that her soul couldn't keep itself together. Now, since souls can't be destroyed—"

"Yeah, they're pretty eternal, but—man, not even when you eat them?"

"Nope. All that energy gets recycled. Might take years, but it does happen eventually. It's pretty interesting. I think you guys have a book on it," he added, a curious look on his face.

I made a mental note to check out said book later, and then asked him to continue.

"Her soul was extremely volatile at this point, and... I'm not sure of the details, but somehow, its whole _configuration_ was just..."

"Corrupted?" I filled in.

"Yeah. It was insane. She couldn't even control her form anymore. She was terrifying most of the time."

The topic looked like it was getting hard for him to handle, so I stopped probing. He apologized again and left, far too quickly for my liking. I had the overwhelming feeling that he knew a lot more than he was letting on. He wasn't the killer—but it seemed all too likely that he knew who was. I should've followed him, should've made him tell, but it was too late to try and go after him. He was gone.

 _Breathe. You'll figure this out._

I sighed and made a portal for the base.

With all the new technology, it was surprising to find that traditional books still existed, but as Marx later explained, there were some differences, especially with the paper itself. Plant-based paper had been rendered obsolete nearly a century ago, and everything was now created from a resilient, fully biodegradable, nontoxic synthetic material—cardboard, tissues, the lot. Humans were expected to catch up within a few decades.

The library was on the ground floor of the building where I'd been spending most of my time, a short walk from the main entrance. It gave off an antique vibe similar to the tailor's place, with a dark red carpet stretching across the entire room and stained wood shelves that climbed all the way to the ceiling. Each was equipped with a rolling ladder, and at the end of every row was a holographic touch screen, opened to a digital catalogue. The futuristic technology and fairy tale-esque designs went well better than should've been possible.

I went over to one of the screens and took a look around the interface. There was a basic search option that worked with keywords, titles—the usual—and an option that brought up a detailed, three-dimensional map of the library. The books could be tapped to display details, and if a book was out, its model would appear as a bright red outline instead of the regular colours. I loved it.

I spent a few minutes figuring out where the books on souls were located and then headed over. With little information on the book itself, it'd definitely be a slow process, but I was determined to find it.

By the time I found anything even remotely like what Esteban had mentioned, my neck was burning from looking at so many different spines. Then it caught my eye; _The Immortality of the Soul_. That had to be it. I took a moment to memorize its location on the shelf, pulled it out, and then sat down on the floor and started reading.

It was a relatively short book, consisting of only about thirty pages, which I got through in no time. It described how the soul itself could never be truly destroyed, although it could be corrupted or torn apart, like Esteban had said. Sicknesses of the soul rarely affected physical beings, like humans. The body around it functioned as a shield against most negative changes, and if they did occur, the soul would feed off the body to heal itself, and this was one of the many possible reasons for short periods of unexplained headaches and lethargy, a side effect of the body restoring the borrowed energy. Those that lacked a proper physical body were more prone to corruption, especially if they lacked the necessary willpower to fight such afflictions. Supposedly, spells existed to aid in reversing corruption or to restore a shattered soul to one piece, but these were difficult to come by and even more difficult to cast, so few bothered.

"Why is everything so complicated?" I said aloud, closing the book.

"You're not the first to come in here and say that," I heard, and I turned. The librarian was gazing tiredly at me from behind a massive stack of papers strewn on her desk.

I gave a slight grimace. "It's a lot to take in. I mean, we've got thousands of books here dedicated to just figuring out how this stuff works."

"You have time," she said. "You'll learn eventually."

I sighed and replaced the book. She waved me goodbye as I left the room.

 **O O O**

James was officially "missing". William and I were both aware of what had happened, but neither of us could figure out who was behind it. All we knew was that whoever it was, they were damn good at covering up their tracks.

Days passed and I tried talking to Esteban again, hoping I could get some more information on the killer, but he could barely bring himself to speak when I found him.

"I'm so sick," he told me, burying his face in his hands. "I want it to end. I just want it to end. I felt so disgusting eating that soul. I can't take it."

"What? No, what are you saying?"

He raised his head, gave a tired look. "Maybe I'll reincarnate into a human. I've done enough good, I think."

"Oh, no. No—no no no, come on. No, anything but that, Esteban. God, no. Listen to me, we can figure something out!" I was nearly screaming. I couldn't lose someone like that again. "I know we can. Please."

"I'm sorry. It was nice meeting you, Johan. Goodnight."

He leapt off the roof and vanished somewhere into the shadows, too quick for my eyes to follow. I thought about calling him, but he was stubborn, too stubborn. He wouldn't listen.

I never saw him again after that.

It didn't take me long to decide that he was dead, either by his own hands or someone else's. Part of me felt horrible, the part of me that believed maybe he could've lived peacefully as a demon, found other ways to curb his hunger that didn't require someone's entire soul—and part of me was cautiously optimistic, hopeful that the universe would work out in his favour and whatever higher power was in charge of reincarnation would allow him to live again as something other than a demon.

William left a few days later without warning, without telling me where he was regarding the James Schmidt case. Esteban was gone and I hardly ever saw Laura anymore, and all my old friends had mostly abandoned me, too repelled by the slowly growing darkness around me. Every demise, every moment of guilt I felt—all of it was only fuel. Depression had nothing on this.

Maybe I wasn't alone, but in that moment, surrounded by nothing but death, I really, truly felt like the loneliest person in the world.


	6. Dead Reckoning

" _Onibi._ " Alexander was showing me a paragraph from a book he'd picked up. "That's why we all have green eyes and not some other colour. The phosphorus from our corpses gathered in our eyes as both a reminder of what we did and to give us the ability to see spirits and stuff."

"Cool."

Let me say this again: being the odd one out in a nearly immeasurable group of people who all committed suicide to get to where they are is not a nice feeling. Neither is being reminded of this fact by some blissfully unaware thirteen-year-old you've hardly even met. But since I was going through some Reaper-exclusive information on demons, and since he was apparently just as into reading for pleasure as I tended to be, we were stuck together.

"Wanna be roomies?"

I shook my head, a bit surprised by the question. "I've still got a pretty nice place to stay, and I want to make the most of it before I have to leave, y'know?"

"Mm... It's pretty lonely living on my own, though. Tell me if you change your mind."

Working as a Reaper meant I was entitled to one of the thousands of suites available in every district as part of the package. Most stayed because they couldn't form a decent alibi that would permit them to remain in whatever space they'd previously occupied—or, more commonly, because they were invisible to mortal eyes and thus it was assumed empty. Even more commonly because dickish higher-ups wouldn't let them, saying that they'd agreed to leave every aspect of their old life behind when they'd committed suicide, even the dingy old cabin located half a dozen kilometres off the grid. But I had a nice house. Nice dog, nice parents. I wasn't quite ready to leave that behind, even if it made things a little more convenient.

I left the book headed back to the lounge, where I poured myself a coffee and took a seat next to Marx. "Hey."

"Hey," he said back, not looking up from his work.

"Um... is something wrong?"

"Oh—no, nothing."

There was a sickening tension in the room, something like a hot, stagnant air lingering over us. I was already going over scenarios in my head, wondering what might've happened to get him in such a mood. "Elliot again?" I ventured.

"Yeah, actually." He tilted his head slightly, gave a wry smile. "Johan, hopefully you remember how I told you some time ago to stay away from him when he's sober."

"Dude, yeah, of course I do. Why?"

"Because when he's _sober,_ there's nothing there to calm his violent tendencies."

"Violent tendencies." I raised an eyebrow. "Marx, you think I don't already know about that?"

"I know you don't," he answered, shrugging. "Not all of it, anyway. What do you think that scar on his throat is from?"

"His suicide?"

"Yeah. You wanna know what he did? He had a breakdown and jammed a kitchen knife straight through, severed his own fucking _spinal cord._ This happened in the span of less than five minutes. He went from perfectly calm to _dead._ "

I blinked, a bit startled by the sudden change of tone. "Um, wow? But why are you telling me this?"

"Because I'm _scared,_ okay? Johan, man, I know you were with Elliot a while ago. Yeah, nothing happened, but there's a reason I told you to stay away from him. Elliot is fucked in the head and I've never for the life of me been able to predict an episode. There is _literally_ no telling when he'll snap."

"Yeah? And what happens when he snaps?"

Marx's immediate response was to pull out his phone and type something into the web browser, and then thrust it into my hands not two seconds later. "Read it," he said flatly. "All of it."

I wasn't sure what I expected. On the screen was a long article hosted on some Australian database I'd never heard of, describing a series of murders committed in Melbourne between the late 50s and early 70s. The victims were young, often attractive adults both male and female, and the methods ranged from strangled to stabbed to even burned alive in one case. The killer was never caught, it emphasized.

I couldn't get to the death count before the phone was smacked out of my hands, landing halfway across the room with a clatter.

"Speak of the devil." Marx slowly walked over and picked it up, casting a vicious look over his shoulder. "And be a little more careful with my stuff, would you?"

"Sooorry..." Elliot staggered a little, gave a chuckle. "Why ya gotta be scarin' Johan like that?"

"Wow, I don't know, maybe because I don't want him _dead,_ asshole."

"You know I'm over all that," he said, grimacing—grinning?—in the phone's general direction. "Don't be fearmongering"—he said this with a pronounced slur—"everyone you meet."

"Jesus Christ, why do I even bother?" Marx muttered to himself. "Fuck off, would you? That or I'm moving to another Goddamned district."

Elliot took another look at me, some odd mix of pity and amusement, and headed off with a shrug. Whatever he thought of the situation, he didn't make it clear. Maybe that was a good thing.

 **O O O**

On Wednesday, January 19h, a few days after that incident, I broached the topic of the would-be murder. Elliot carried a horrendously short fuse and I expected nothing but hell, but I tried anyway, opening with the deceptively simple question of "James. Do you know someone named James Schmidt?"

Whatever he had with him that day, it smelled surprisingly weak, vaguely of a pomegranate or something similar. He gave a thoughtful look and answered, "I don't. Why?"

"Blond," I continued, ignoring him. "Brown eyes. Murdered the 12th."

"Johan, I told you—"

"Numerous stab wounds and lacerations." I furrowed my brows at him.

He stood up, fixed his glasses roughly before repeating again, "I don't know him. Has Marx gotten you suspicious of me now?"

I said nothing.

"Just like the rest," I heard him mutter. "Johan, be a dear and learn some bloody tact the next time you want to ask me something like this, will you?" he growled, knuckles white around the travel mug.

Elliot immediately drew up a portal right then and there and left before I could follow him, or even catch a glimpse of where he'd headed. The crinkles of light hung in the air long after the opening closed; I just stared.

According to others, I was brutally and painfully honest in my speech and actions, leading to offended people and angry outbursts nearly everywhere I went. Rumour had it I entirely lacked the ability to sugarcoat things even if I wanted to—why I thought I might have success with the most quick-tempered person I knew like that, I had no idea.

Class next day was hell. Between the countless passive-aggressive remarks every time someone mentioned death, and the vicious stares he kept giving me in particular, Elliot definitely made his mood known. Whether or not it bothered the few classmates I had remained unknown. I wondered how many times this had already happened before I arrived.

"Bleeding is a common cause of death, you'll find." Marx tilted his head slightly. "Fatal blood loss. Hemorrhages. Clots."

That was one such sentence that Elliot would somehow find a crack in, somewhere he could insert a line about murders with a perpetual indignant sneer. Marx bounced back each and every time, ignoring him, it seemed, completely. He acted like he didn't just hear an obscenely vivid joke about dismembering someone, or some so-stupid-it's-good pun that made a few students chuckle. He had the stony, emotionless appearance only a Reaper—maybe a lawyer—could be expected to bear. That is, until he snapped, some two dozen interruptions later.

He drew up a finely decorated battle axe—his Death Scythe—and thrust it right at Elliot's face, stopping millimetres from his skin. "Shut your fucking mouth," he said, eyes burning.

"You don't scare me."

Marx immediately responded by lowering his weapon, such that it was aimed directly at his chest—no, his soul. "I'm not the only one here open to killing," he hissed. "Either you _shut up_ or I'll give you another murder to talk about."

"Will you?" It was then that I saw Elliot's left hand open behind his back, felt a buzz of awfully familiar energy. Christ, he wasn't seriously—no, was he?

Marx didn't look away. "Class dismissed."

"Oh, no, you've got to be kidding," I said, standing up. "Marx—"

" _Class dismissed._ "

Everyone else had already left in a hurry, but I wasn't budging. "Marx," I began, "you calm the fuck down or I'm calling—" I stopped, realizing I wasn't sure _who_ to call if something went down between Reapers. Reaper Police Department? Goddamn. "Just calm down, both of you! I'm not gonna just sit here and have you fucking _maul_ each other!"

"Then leave," he said, a brutal look on his face.

"No."

He froze, glanced at me. "Excuse me?"

" _No._ Marx, I'm not leaving. Put that thing away and take a fucking chill pill."

"In case you've forgotten, _Johannes,_ you're worth _nothing_ in our ranks at this moment, leaving me and just about everyone else with full authority over you. And I am ordering you to _leave._ "

"Fuck your authority. I'm not leaving."

Elliot stared at me, a look on his face like oh boy, now you've done it. I'd never seen Marx—that quiet, mysterious Reaper who always seemed to know everything, everyone, had a cool head rivalled only by William—no, I'd never seen him this absolutely furious in my life.

"Johan, this is between me and Elliot, and no one else. _Leave._ "

One second turned into three and then ten, and I still had not moved an inch from where I stood. Marx's weapon remained in his grip, reeking of death itself; meanwhile Elliot, again, was calm as ever, hands back in his slacks' pockets and all traces of energy gone. I wondered what was going through his mind in that moment.

"I think," Elliot suddenly said, "the kid has a point. You want to talk about fifty-year-old murders, you don't do it with a bloody axe to my chest."

 _Jesus Christ, at least_ he _gets it._

Elliot immediately walked out of the room, only sending a short look of gratitude my way before disappearing down the halls; I left some several seconds after him. Marx stayed a very, very long time. I could sense his Scythe for hours.

I didn't sleep that night.

When I came in the next day, the first thing I did was find Elliot and—well, I tried apologizing, but he'd have none of it, cutting me off every time with a "fuck off" or a "I have a hangover, ask again later" or "Jesus Christ, kid, take a bloody hint". Normally I would've just responded with something equally snarky and left, but I really did feel sorry for what I said to him early and I wanted him to know.

Some twenty minutes had passed just trying to get a word in edgewise, and I was sick. I walked up to him again and immediately started with, "Whatever you're gonna say to me, just hold on for two seconds and listen, please. I'm sorry for all that—that shit I pulled on you a few days ago, I'm sorry. I'm just really freaked out about this James thing and—like, I'm just trying to figure out who's responsible. It was rude to jump to conclusions just because of something Marx said. So here it is, the most sincere apology I've given to someone in years."

"Not accepted," he said flatly.

"Elliot—"

He huffed and stood up. "Listen, Johan. Some of us aren't exactly comfortable getting called out on all the shit we did as humans, alright? That _includes_ cold-blooded murders. Now, I'll say this again: I didn't kill James and I've no idea who did. Is that good enough? Now please, just leave me alone. If you really want to talk to me that bad, wait until everything's cooled down. _Please._ "

"... Alright."

"Christ," he muttered. "I need a cigarette..."

He left the room, I guess to go smoke. I stopped looking after that, the last of my leads exhausted. Whoever it was, I could only hope that they didn't have plans for anytime soon.

 **O O O**

Several days passed. William was back and I found myself back in a therapist's office late that afternoon; this one went by Dr. Spencer, and though she was far less abrasive than Morrison and had a persistent, warm look on her face, she'd already proven herself to be no different.

"I can feel deaths before they happen," I finally confessed, after a long, hopeless half hour of talking.

"Oh?" She stopped for a moment and took a glance at my eyes. I wondered distantly if she knew; if she did, she didn't say anything. "Well, lots of people are like that, actually."

"Yeah? Do they also see detailed visions and have breakdowns over not being able to stop the death?"

"That—" She broke off, flustered. I could already feel the diagnosis forming in her mind—schizophrenia, that's what's causing this, here are some pills, everything is just a coincidence, you're only imagining things, yada yada yada. Fuck right off.

I tilted my head slightly at her. "See, now, this is why I didn't tell anyone. It's like, shit, you either toss me in the loony bin, or you just can't do anything to help me. What's the point in knowing I can predict people's deaths if you can't stop everything it's been causing? Depression, paranoia, guilt—holy shit, the guilt. How are you going to help with the guilt? Yeah, you knew how this person was going to die, on what date, where if you got lucky—but it's not your fault you were too inadequate to stop it. Or are you going to start spewing that 'God had a plan for them' bullshit and try to convince me that it was destiny they died? Murdered in his 20s, 'God had a plan for him' my fucking ass. Jumped off a roof, 'God had a plan for her'. Car crash that had her skull split open and the steering wheel wedged inside, 'God had a plan for her', yeah? Sorry for ranting and good luck with whatever you were going to say."

She gave a thoughtful look, fumbled a little with the words before coming up with, "Have you tried blocking these... blocking these _visions_ out?"

I sighed.

 **O O O**

It was the next day that James was pronounced dead until further notice. Traces of dried blood on the shop's doormat, which would've been shielded from the elements by the large overhang, were found to contain his DNA, so the story went. Nothing was caught by the security cameras and he'd been seen all around town that day—chances were they simply forgot to check that area until weeks later. Whatever the case, it didn't concern me much. All I knew was that the person responsible was still out there with zero leads, including what the local police had found—and it was unlikely they could come up with anything good. They hardly knew what they were up against.

"Morning."

I looked up. "Um... morning."

Elliot leaned against the wall. "Still on that case? James or whatever his name was."

"Yeah, I am. Why?"

"I might have an idea who killed him. Might."

"I'm listening."

"So there's this demon."

"A demon," I repeated. "And?"

"He used to go on sprees around here years ago. Bloody sadistic, he was. Do you remember the state of the body?"

"Nah, I never—never got to see it," I said, shaking my head. "No one did, actually. Only reason we know about it is 'cause of my vision and the records changing. Definitely could've been like, super mangled or..."

"Ah, in any case, Spears oughta know something about this guy."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, works with a lot of demons—wouldn't be surprised if he's run into him before." He shrugged and pulled out a flask of something obscenely strong-smelling, not caring much who saw. I just frowned. "Johan, remember this is just a possibility. But it might be worth checkin' out."

There was a light pity in his eyes, but it seemed to me that he didn't care much about early deaths; whether it was his past or working as a Reaper, he'd clearly become desensitized.

"Thanks," I eventually answered, and left him to his own devices.

William's temporary office was almost nearly as he left it, save for a slightly different positioning of all the boxes. There was a tiny bonsai on his desk, next to a spray bottle and some single-use plant food packs. I wondered if this was his attempt at familiarizing a setting he kept coming back to more and more frequently.

"Good morning," I said.

"Good morning." He hesitated. "James—"

"I know. It's not nice to think about, but it's not the end of the world. I guess... I just hope there wasn't too much pain." I grimaced. "Um... Elliot said maybe it was a demon. What do you think?"

"It's likely."

"How come?"

He gave a long, thoughtful look, and then broke it all down for me; how there'd been a massive spike of demon activity in the past few decades, enough to warrant a separate division just to deal with it all. Very little Grim Reapers had actually fought a demon, though, and it was risky business—so for now, only those with preexisting experience were being assigned. He was one of those few, a powerful fighter no matter the enemy, so he became part of that new division. For now. And yes, someone was filling in for him back in London.

"But that many demons all of a sudden—what do you think's going on?"

He closed his eyes for a moment. "Many of them are human in origin. If I had to guess, it likely has something to do with the current state of the world..."

"Oh, you can—you can tell the origin of a demon?"

He nodded bleakly. "It's not too hard when you know what to look for."

"Huh. And he doesn't have a name or something?"

"If he does, I don't know it."

I frowned slightly. "What does he look like?"

"In his true form? Catlike, no bigger than a child. Hugely underwhelming, as a colleague of mine once put it. But you see, he almost never appears like this," he said, resting his head in his hands. "Usually—" He paused and closed his eyes. "Usually, he presents as an exceedingly attractive young man. Light skin, brown hair..."

I considered this for a moment, bringing back memories of the person I'd seen "So if he usually takes on a human form, then maybe he's the guy I saw in that vision?"

"It's possible."

"But how would you find him if that was the case? He could be anywhere."

"That's true, but..." He picked up his Death Scythe and warped it away with a wave of his other hand. "He always had a very particular aura, even for a demon. It shouldn't be too hard to track him down."

I didn't say anything.

 **O O O**

William called me later that week to say that the demon, whoever or whatever he'd been, was dead, probably set for a quick trip to purgatory and back based on the apparent origin. Caught in the act, he was—the would-be victim was alive, if a little disoriented. Rumour had it he was a hallucinogen enthusiast, though, and I figured that would lessen the blow of what had happened; more than likely, he'd just think of everything as a bad trip. That was my hope, anyway—since I couldn't possibly tell him that he'd almost been killed by a supernatural entity.

James was still dead. But at least we saved someone.

Days turned into weeks and then months with no deaths, and I finally managed to settle down.

Perhaps the only worthwhile occurrence was my... well, not promotion. More like graduation from the first half of training, along with my few classmates. I was given a choice of fields to work in when I finished all the training, such as forensics or data. Field knowledge was mandatory no matter what I chose, which was tentatively soul collecting. I could train for something else if I later wanted, but I would still be on-duty, making it that little bit harder. That was implying I hadn't already juggled two lives before.

As well as increased privileges, I was given a new pair of glasses and—with some difficulty—a Death Scythe.

The glasses weren't anything special—just a slight change from round to oval frames, to match the new rank. I wondered if my parents would notice the difference. They certainly hadn't when I made the switch from the aviators, which continued to gather dust in my nightstand drawer.

The Death Scythe was a basic sickle comprised of regular wood and metal—and enchanted with an ancient magic known only to Reapers, giving it its characteristic abilities. So I was told. That magic permanently linked itself to the owner, meaning not only were they only one who could carry out certain tasks with that weapon, they were also intrinsically its most powerful user. Whether or not the latter still applied in the case of differing skill levels wasn't mentioned, but it was logical to assume that someone vastly stronger would easily have an advantage over someone, even with a foreign Death Scythe.

The higher-ups were apparently outrageously distrustful when it came to rookies and letting them run around unsupervised with almighty weapons, but I managed to get the all-clear to keep mine on me at all times. The condition was that if I did anything even remotely questionable... well, actually, I wasn't sure what would happen, but seeing as I wasn't authorized whatsoever to use my Scythe outside of training yet—or even keep it in the storage space instead of sheathed and unconcealed, for that matter—I imagined it wouldn't be very good.

Coming back to school with that kind of power was the strangest thing. I felt... distant. Knowing that I could end someone's life like that, at a second's notice—it changed how I saw everyone. How I saw myself. I wondered if this was how the killer felt.

Valentine's Day came and went; Kenny and Allison entered an official relationship after an apparent love I hadn't even noticed. Elliot sent Marx the most hilariously low-budget card I'd ever seen, which consisted of a slab of cardboard from a cereal box with "DATE ME ASSHOLE" written on the blank side in thick, purple sharpie. Me, I didn't do anything. I didn't mind all that much.

It really did seem like we solved the case. But weeks later, on a brutally cold March evening, one of our own Reapers went missing. Out on an assignment or playing hooky, maybe—just about everyone thought that, until she was found dead in a crumbling, abandoned nightclub, wounds the likes of which I never wanted to see again in my life. Shredded skin, visible bones, dried blood everywhere.

There wasn't a trace of demon's energy on her.


	7. And the Band Kept Playing

Amanda Adams arrived in 1902, and was well-known for her extravagant hairstyles and therapeutic advice. She popularized use of a certain body-altering magic for simpler, more subtle ends, such as longer nails or darker lips—magic that had been made available for Reapers who committed suicide because of their bodies, Reapers who were left in such a catatonic state of agony at the mere sight of them that even simple tasks were impossible. Amanda had a perpetually optimistic air about her even given her surroundings, and it was that air that seemed to draw everyone to her. Her cheer was contagious.

I never knew her personally, but I understood she was very much loved around the office. That there was a huge uproar around her death didn't surprise me.

The problem now was that no one knew this wasn't the only recent mauling, that the reason I of all people was so distraught was because we thought we _had_ the guy, thought we'd solved it all. Nope. William went back into his shell, livid at how everything had turned out—never mind that he'd gotten rid of someone just as dangerous in the process. It wasn't who he was looking for. It seemed to me then that he was a closet perfectionist of sorts, unable to accept when things went a little off plan. We were similar in that respect.

"It's a Reaper," I said, flipping through the photos of Amanda's corpse. "It's gotta be a Reaper. But who the hell would do... _that?_ And to someone like her? It's fucking ridiculous. I don't _understand._ "

William didn't say anything, only kept slowly tapping the desk with a finger. I frowned.

"None of the human vics had any giveaways in their records and Amanda's wasn't even in the library last anyone checked. Man, pardon my vocabulary, but whoever's behind this clearly knows their shit if they can cover their tracks like this. It's... scary." I furrowed my brows, shook my head. "Something must've happened. A fight or something. Who did she talk to last? Anyone? ... You probably don't know," I muttered, frown deepening.

"It wouldn't matter," he said, closing his eyes for a moment. "Adams talked to everyone. It would take a bloody miracle to pick a suspect out of that many people."

"But—"

"A _bloody miracle,_ Johannes." His right eyebrow twitched slightly.

"I understand. I'm just... worried. Worried and angry. Whoever did this—"

"—will be found and punished accordingly," he filled in, voice hardening. "It's not that easy, Johannes. Do you think whoever is responsible would just _confess_ if I went around asking?"

"Jeez, no. No." I squeezed my hands anxiously. "I... I just... I don't know. I don't know..."

"I'll tell you if I find anything," he said, standing up and absently strolling over to a bookshelf. "I have a lot of other things on my mind and I'd just prefer it if you didn't always..."

"Pester you? Yeah, I get it. Most people gimme that after a while." I shrugged. "Yeah, it's cool. Sorry, Mr. Spears."

I felt a fleeting pity from him at that, but that was it. I grabbed my things and left.

Classes these days came easier, just familiar facts and techniques. I had about half of all causes of death and a slew of fighting tactics for every occasion in the back of my mind, and all that was left at that point was proving myself in the exams. Those came every several months and were open to anyone in the latter part of their training. Pairs of students were assigned to a human near the end of their schedule and were given the entirety of that time to go over the teachings and get a proper look at the person, determining whether or not mercy would truly be beneficial before deciding a final course of action.

The problem was that everyone I knew had already completed the exams.

I didn't really mind this. It gave me more time to memorize my facts in earnest, and consider my course of action after graduating, like how I'd fit field work into my school schedule. And when I'd finish the last of my written assignments.

Elliot often mentioned this in our gym sessions, between hits. "I'm just worried," he'd say, foam blade to my chest. "Talk to me if you need anything, love."

And then I'd chuckle faintly and collapse to the floor, slipping under him and knocking him into that same fatal position before replying, "I'm good. Just takes me a while to get stuff done. I'll hand it in eventually."

He'd frown and teleport a few steps out of my reach, and then ask something like, "Ever been diagnosed with anything?"

Elliot always had a familiar pity in his eyes when he encroached on that topic, seamlessly blended into a cynical sadism in a way that was almost surreal. He knew what it was like to be ill and he knew that the little things were just as much of a struggle, and that gave him an uncanny therapeutic quality.

I'd keep quiet for a moment, tracking the twitch of his foot, the split-second glances at my weak spots, and then I'd turn matter-of-fact and tell him, "I think I have ADD."

At that point, it was a no-brainer. Maybe it was mild. Maybe I just needed some tricks. But it was still there, and it certainly interfered with things. Often I'd joke about being a basket case, struggling with a dozen things I'd been diagnosed with and another dozen I hadn't.

Elliot would run up and try to catch me off guard, and then he'd say, "Think meds'd help or nah?"

"Maybe," I'd answer, trying to push the weapon away with my own. "But if Reapers are all heavyweights with alcohol, what's it like with medicine? Can't imagine how I'd afford all that."

"Shit, good point. Spells?"

"A spell for ADD?"

"Nah, just focus and stuff in general."

And then I'd lose myself in the possibility that something I'd been plagued by for years could be fixed that easily, and I'd come to on the floor, blade pressed against my ribs.

I took the frequency as a sign and headed off to the library after that last session, meticulously sorting through stacks of spells and lore during whatever free time I could find. Days passed and I eventually came upon a book devoted to assisting scholars, with magic for instant knowledge and enhanced memory and everything I could ever ask for.

I set up shop in the very back of the room, with a to-do list of spells and a tiny bag of ingredients, all of which had been surprisingly easy to obtain. The memory spell was first, and then one for focus. The knowledge spell I used to give myself a crash course in driving and perfect understanding of all my favourite instruments, as well as fluency in German and Latin, just for kicks. Then I packed up and left.

Weeks passed.

Every so often, William would welcome me into his office and we'd spend the hour in near-silence, talking about succulents and how to care for them and trying to find connections between the murders. Occasionally he'd have a pot of tea out, often some otherworldly combination of spices I wouldn't have imagined could taste good together. Sometimes we'd mention something from the news, a mass shooting or a withheld cure somewhere, to make a few dead bodies a little less serious.

"It's awful." I was staring at the bonsai on his desk, head in my hands. "But who are we to complain?"

William gave a thoughtful look. "How's your training going?"

"It's good. Just gotta tie up some loose ends and I should be done by the end of the month."

"Have you decided on a division?"

"It's just fieldwork at the moment," I said, shaking my head slightly.

"See me when you graduate. I might have something for you."

I wasn't sure what he meant by that, but it sounded interesting. I tucked a note into my wallet and left for the library, where I spent the rest of the afternoon finishing the last of my work.

By the next morning, there wasn't a blank section that I could see, and I headed off to find Elliot. He was alone in class, juggling between his phone and a bowl of pasta. I waved hello and slid a stack of papers onto the table beside him, and then went back to my desk, where I cozied up with a Stephen King novel and waited. And waited. And _waited._

Maybe an hour later, I felt him nudge me, and I looked up.

"You're done," he said. "Congrats."

"Took me long enough," I breathed, closing the book.

"Now, your grades..." He paused, fixed his glasses with one hand. "Y'know, normally we gotta take points off for late assignments, but I'll let it slide. Consider it an apology for—"

"Everything?"

He chuckled. "Yep. Straight A's. Do with that what y'will."

"And exams?"

"Going on another three weeks. Marx oughta know if there's an opening."

I thanked him and left.

Several hours later, I was assigned to one Sam Jansen, a quiet, middle-aged man with mousy hair and a penchant for old novels. He had an inherited wealth of some several million dollars and lived in a small, single-storey house a few streets from me, where he spent most of his time. Sam was also scheduled to die in exactly seventeen days, and it was my task—alone, if I didn't want to wait for the next exam period to find a partner—to decide if he deserved the fate set out for him. Meet the criteria, and I was good to go.

I quickly figured out his stops and started frequenting the cafe he liked to read at, invisibility switched on and ears perked for information. Sometimes I'd come out and chat him up, asking what kind of things he liked to do and how long he'd been in town. The things he said, most of them were average, everyday; some less so, like volunteering at the animal shelter every Tuesday and leaving an extra dollar in every vending machine he used. He was a warm, kind soul, that much I could tell early on. He loved the world and everything in it. But he was also a shut-in for the most part, affecting little lives for good or bad. Short answer: mercy wouldn't benefit anyone other than himself, and that was hardly the kind of exception I was looking to make.

Sam was some sixty years old, with more than a good run under his belt. I certainly didn't feel good deciding on something like that, but it calmed me a little knowing that he wasn't dying young. The cause was officially cardiac arrest, an attack strong enough to kill him within minutes. Date: Sunday, October 9th, 2016. 4:32 PM.

By the end of the second week, I was spending my days doodling in his backyard, wondering if things would really be so simple and how I'd cope if they weren't. I couldn't imagine something like reaping a soul could be easy. At least, not the first time.

When I finally found myself inside his house, waiting for that fatal moment, I did consider letting him go a few times. Right time, he wouldn't even remember anything had happened, and his body wouldn't be the wiser. But again, he didn't offer anything unique to the world.

"Sam, listen," I told him, trying to ignore the pain on his face "You're dying. I'm in charge of taking you to the afterlife. I wish I could make this easier, but—" I shook my head, gave him a weak smile. "I haven't done this before. Sorry."

I didn't expect him to believe a word. But he did.

"Everyone's gotta start somewhere," he wheezed, looking up at me. "Hurry up and I won't judge you for that."

I honoured his wish and ended his life a few minutes earlier than scheduled, watching with wide eyes as his Cinematic Record appeared, showing everything from when he was a baby up until the last breath he took. And then it was gone. And I was done.

 **O O O**

Andrew sent me my new glasses later that evening, shiny black cat's eyes like the ones I'd drawn on myself all those months ago. The Scythe took a little longer, but after some pestering and a thick pile of forms, I gained access to the district's weapon expert, who happily modified it for me.

The final design was reminiscent of a scimitar, with a long, curved blade and a black wire-wrapped grip. Near the end of the sword on the blade's otherwise blunt top were two sloped edges, which could be used to hold off another weapon, and diagonally down from that, a short distance from the main edge, were six stones of obsidian, gradually decreasing in size and fitted in such a way that they were visible from both sides. The top of the blade was stained black, and the hand- and cross-guard consisted of tangled silver filigree, with a similarly obsidian-eyed skeleton and several roses embedded in its centre.

Looking at them, I wasn't actually sure what kind of stones they were exactly. That part of the weapon was left unspecific, entirely up to magical chance. I kept calling them that, but for all I knew, they could've been an amalgam of a thousand different things. Whatever they were, it didn't matter much to me.

I took the Scythe, got a feel for how it handled. Much of the weight was in the tip of the blade, adding a unique set of fighting styles that wouldn't have been possible without my enhanced strength. "This is amazing," I told him, grinning.

"Ah, but I only helped with the technicalities," he answered with a grin of his own. "You did most of the work."

"So I guess I'd keep this in that hammerspace or whatever. But then—" I paused, shook my head. "I've had my powers just stop working before; I get so anxious sometimes I can't even teleport. What if there's an emergency and I can't reach it?"

"There's another method out there, but it's old, old magic. Hardly anyone can pull it off anymore." He took another minute to finish sharpening the blade he was working on, looked it over carefully, and then sighed, saying, "You really want it on you that bad?"

I nodded.

"Disguise it with a glamour."

"What, like what that guy what's-his-name did back in like, the 19th century?"

"Exactly."

"How am I supposed to do _that?_ "

He stood up, taking the finished weapon with him and gently leaning it against the wall. "You see, Johannes, every single one of us, from the moment we set hands on our Death Scythes and they become attuned to our energy, is able to create a glamour—among many other things. But..."

"'But'?"

"Like I said, it's old magic. Need good willpower and visualization skills on top of just knowing how to do it." He shrugged, picking up another blueprint from his desk and setting it on top of the furnace. "If you really want to try, look up glamours in the library. It's the only book there."

I hesitated for a moment before replying, "Will do. Thank you."

So that was it; maybe whatever happened that first year was just the result of a particularly arduous adjustment period. Deaths stopped upsetting me after my time with Sam, wrong as that felt, and I was using my powers with ease, climbing up to the proverbial top of the ladder far quicker than many were comfortable with. In particular, I was finding marked improvements in my Death Scythe proficiency, growing with my attachment towards the weapon—the kind of immense familiarity that was rare, apparently.

As it turned out, strong powers equalled a strong link, and numerous multipliers existed on top of that. Willpower and emotions, inner energy and skill, and even just wielding that particular Scythe.

Whatever the combination was in my case, I was able to get that spell working within minutes, shrinking my Scythe down to a small, oval brooch of intricately carved silver and a black stone not unlike the ones on its original form. I wore it pinned to my lapel and carried it in my pocket when I wasn't dressed up.

Months passed in radio silence and it started to feel like maybe that was the last of it. William was still deep in his research and I was perpetually uneasy regardless, but no one really mentioned the murders anymore. No one died the next day. Or the next. We let down our guards. Nothing happened.

Things were good.


	8. Welcome to Your New Life

The next few months were slow, easier than I'd expected. School was much less of an ordeal without the extra homework, and although I definitely wasn't up to AP levels, I was passing. For now.

Most of my concerns around that time centred around a job I had that coming Friday, the 10th of March: my first big outing, a fire scheduled to claim six people. I'd never been comfortable around flames and I still wasn't, always thinking back to the burns I went through as a kid and the effects they had every time I saw something alight. But I agreed anyway, weaving a lie for my parents that I was out watching a movie with friends and then setting off.

The scene was a large, two-storey restaurant serving various styles of wings, pasta, and pizza. It was something of an old childhood memory and it felt odd coming back that night, Death Scythe pinned to my coat and a list of the victims cradled in my right arm. I was already at the location a good forty minutes in advance, where I promptly stripped to my dress shirt and tie and sat myself at the on-site bar.

A fake ID I'd made months ago was plopped in front of me, showing my full, rightful name and an age several years older than I really was. "Since I know you'll ask," I said, brows raised a little. Whatever happened didn't matter. Johnathan, as his name tag read, wasn't one of the survivors.

Any doubts he had about my age faded by my fourth drink, after I still wasn't so much as tipsy. Elliot's words of alcoholic wisdom certainly rang true, that whole story about how Reapers took forever and a day to get drunk. All I could think about was how on earth he could afford that kind of amount.

I spent the rest of my time convincing total strangers to let me mooch off their fries—that or hyperventilating in the bathroom. Back and forth I went; by the time I could feel the darkness looming over me, I had already completely memorized its appearance. White floor. Blue walls. Exactly seven chips in the mirror. Those who were sitting near the door started giving me strange looks after my sixth trip inside.

Ten minutes before 8:52 was when I couldn't take it anymore.

I brought myself into invisibility and crawled to the emptiest part in the restaurant, where I burst into tears. Dizzy, miserable, fucking done. I didn't know how long I spent on the floor or whether I was even hidden, but when I looked up, there were flames spreading through the ceiling, centred around one of the lamps. The burning wood was toxic to my enhanced senses, stinging my eyes. I was staring like a deer in headlights, almost unable to comprehend what was happening, until I finally snapped back into awareness and flipped open my book.

Emilia Brown, two minutes left. First victim.

"Deep breaths," I was saying to myself. Slowly, I stood up and headed back to the main area, one hand carrying the collection of jobs and the other reaching for the brooch pinned to my lapel. It took a minute for someone to finally notice the fire creeping through the ends of the building, and another before someone pulled the alarm. Too late.

I heard screams as the flames crawled up her dress, felt an awful satisfaction creep through me at the sight. I frowned and tightened my grip around my Death Scythe, pushing through the hurried crowd of people. She was collapsed on the floor by the time I got to her, molten and peeling like something out of a cheap horror movie. I felt sick.

Eight seconds; I tilted my head slightly at her, wondered if she knew what I was here for. The glamour slid off my Death Scythe with a flick of my wrist and I bent down.

"Must be fucking painful," I muttered, frown deepening. "You're okay. You're okay..."

Her memories flew out in a white light and we watched, both of us.

 _I was raised on a farm with my two sisters and brother..._

 _My mother died when my brother was born, and father was an alcoholic who abused all of us. He died in '97, leaving us all alone..._

 _We were put into foster care and made to start school. Us four graduated and headed our separate ways. I went to college to study for philanthropy..._

It must've been an hour on our side before the image was engulfed in flames, and the last of the light fled into my blade. I distantly considered sparing her, thinking that maybe a career in something like that could be beneficial to others, but decided against it. Time sped back up and I pulled my Scythe out of her chest. Born April 3rd, 1992. Died March 10th, 2017, due to extensive fourth-degree burns. Next.

I warped a short distance from the second victim, a brunette sprawled by a wall of fire. She would've gotten out alive if it weren't for the alcohol. She was already dead before the flames even reached her skin. Another deep breath;

 _I was born into a rich family..._

Riley Hartz. Born September 4th, 1978. Died March 10th, 2017 due to smoke inhalation. Weakened by an overdose. Next.

Jonathan Michaels—the bartender who'd served his last drink today. Took too long to come back from the bathroom. Trapped in the burning room. Crushed under a collapsed building.

The exit was completely blocked, hidden behind a wall of fire. I warped inside and found Jonathan circling the room, fear-stricken and desperate for a way out, something that didn't involve setting himself ablaze Wood was snapping above us and I was ready to begin when something in me stopped, shuddered a little.

I frowned and glanced at the weapon in my hand. The blade was still covered in energy, imprints of the souls I hadn't sent up yet. All of the victims were young. They didn't deserve to die. They never did.

And yet.

"You have a wife and kids," I said, tilting my head slightly. "Adele is sick and won't be able to look after them if you die, Jonathan. Right?"

He didn't answer, only kept trying to find an exit. I wondered if he'd acknowledged me at all, the kid standing in the flames without a care. He was close enough to death to see me no matter how hidden I tried to stay.

The fire was still raging.

My frown deepened. The job came first—that was the duty of a Grim Reaper. To reap the souls of the deceased; review their lives; determine if they should live or die; and act accordingly. The only time a human was spared was if their continued existence would be directly beneficial to others.

I considered my options.

Slowly, I raised my Scythe. And I brought down the door.

Spared one.

Went back to the bar area and pulled out the man who'd passed out from the smoke, scarcely a few minutes from the point of no return. Spared two.

Carried the girl from upstairs into the cold air, doused the flames on her clothes as best I could. Spared three.

That made half.

I didn't regret my actions, I decided, as I quietly left the building and sat outside, eyes on the firetrucks in the distance. Maybe George and Debbie—but Johnathan, he was a good man. He had children and damn if he wouldn't be beneficial to them. Maybe I'd get in trouble, but just then, I truly couldn't bring myself to care.

I sat down in the parking lot and sighed.

 **O O O**

" _How_ many?"

"Three."

"Good lord, boy. Those people you saved? They were throwaways. The lives we spare time and time again, you know what kind of lives they are? The likes of Shakespeare, Mandela, people who have things to give to the world. Not..."

"Yeah. Yeah, I know. Take away my privileges, have me do paperwork all day, whatever. Frankly, I'd be surprised if I wasn't the first newcomer to spare someone undeserving."

I said that last word with a certain harshness, like I didn't want to believe the man in front of me. But it was true, for the most part. My innate sense of mercy and generosity, it was disastrous among Reapers, interfering with one of the unspoken rules of the office: a lack of bias. Saying that it messed with the natural order was a high overstatement, but death nearly always came with reasons, and questioning them? Short answer: risky. 50/50 chance of toppling a domino.

"You're right about that," he admitted, lifting his glasses with a finger to rub his eye. "But it doesn't make it right. Jobs like these, there's simply no place for sympathy."

"I understand. So, written apologies—how do they work?"

 **O O O**

Several days passed and I finally came around to the promised meeting with William.

What he told me, well, it was certainly unexpected. He'd heard about my fighting skills and wanted to know if I'd be interested in living under his wing, try to help him control the rate of demon-related chaos. I agreed pretty quickly.

Our Scythes were leaned against the wall, both freshly polished. His was entirely long-range compared to mine, and between everything we discussed that day, it made me wonder what kind of team we'd make in a battle. Cancelling out each other's Achilles's heels.

As he explained, the demons Reapers often dealt with were far from the standard, incorporeal possessors, the kind that only cared about damning souls and innocently fucking with humanity. These were powerful, age-old hellspawns strong enough to maintain a form of their own and wreak havoc of all sorts, from leaving people walking husks to levelling entire cities. The big fish. Regular priests and hunters of the supernatural tended to lack the skills for fighting those demons, and anyone who was capable, well—they didn't even bother unless the scale was global. Other than Reapers. They actually gave a damn what happened to people's souls.

"That's... selfish," I told him upon finding out. "Like, angels for example, they're stronger than ninety percent of everything out there, including demons and Reapers combined. But this still counts as penance, so maybe it's not all bad, y'know? It's a change from just reaping souls and doing paperwork."

William shrugged, handed me a slim journal filled with defenses and fighting methods. "It's an interesting way of looking at it."

"No, like—someone's killing people by the dozens, I'd be more than happy to take them out," I continued, skimming through the pages. "Beats sitting in an office all day."

The notes listed everything from holy water to full-scale binding spells, massively expensive last resorts with huge payouts. Between those were salt and even the humble crucifix, and among them—"Devil's traps?" I raised an eyebrow. "What is this, _Supernatural_?"

He smiled a little in spite of himself. "They do work, assuming you can lead a demon inside."

"Neato."

Days passed like that; William called every now and again to share some more tips with me, or ask if I could help deal with so-and-so before the death count reached the double digits. We didn't bother passives and they didn't bother us, and that was it for the most part. A lot of it wasn't even fighting, just a flurry of protection spells and disablings while we pondered whether it was more worth the effort just to send that one back to hell. Either way, he definitely saw me as useful.

Those few days turned into months, and by the time summer rolled in, outings like those were a regular occurrence. My skills were well on par with William's and there were probably a dozen times I saved him the stress of an injury, and as for the demons—by that point, it was all nothing but copies of Esteban. Everyone else was taken care of. So we took it easy for a while, went back to daily trivia and discussions over tea.

It was nice.

 **O O O**

My second big outing was a plane crash.

Friday, June 9th, 2017; a small commercial aircraft experienced a catastrophic engine failure, leading to the deaths of eight-three. Those few who didn't perish in the accident suffered excruciating burns and breaks, and one young boy lost use entirely of his left arm and leg.

The flight was scheduled for 1:45, a three-hour trip to a city over in Manitoba. Technicalities saw the job assigned to a Reaper stationed at the take-off location, and between one thing and another, I was somehow the only one free that day. And the board, oh—they did _not_ like that. But again—I was all that remained.

I left school around lunchtime, claiming my time-worn excuse of a doctor's appointment and shedding my jeans and hoodie just out of sight. Marx called me at the airport to make sure I had everything and then let me be, leaving only a little good luck message on my phone. I stole glances at it every now and then, whenever I freaked out about sneaking past security or avoiding bumping into others. Whenever I remembered the smell of burning flesh.

The malfunction wasn't until well into the flight, and I spent that time in an unclaimed seat near the back, sketching portraits. Sometimes I'd shift out of invisibility to flag down a drink, chat someone up, but mostly I just sat there with a pencil and notebook. An overwhelming amount of the faces belonged to the victims.

Those on board stopped brushing off the excessive turbulence by the second hour, when the rocking began to spill trays. The explosion wasn't long after that. Twenty died instantly in the blast; another seven were knocked out of the plane. The rest passed upon the craft's impact.

I spent several hours on my side reaping the early victims, watching everything from college students to former criminals. It was a harrowing experience that struck me worse than anything I could've imagined, and I did break down a few times—sped up enough that I could sit in a nearly motionless plane, spent a couple minutes crying before jumping back to work. Rinse and repeat. Apologizing, comforting the victims as best I could—that helped a little, but not nearly enough.

Those that fell forced me out of the plane, and I had to learn then and there just how far I could teleport at a time, and if I could use warps to break my fall—fifty metres if I tried, and yes. My landing was awful, but nothing was damaged, not even my suit.

I took another hour or so to reap those seven, and waited there in the Canadian wilderness, Scythe next to me. The animals were long gone and all I could do was watch as the plane took a nosedive into the grass, a little under an acre away from where I was sitting. The initial blast died down after a few seconds, and I warped over.

It felt like a whole day I was inside, watching records and checking off names. Three of the passengers survived by sheer miracle; the little boy and a young couple. I waited with them for the help, never once mentioning who I was or how I was among those still alive. For all they knew I was just another kid, drab and distressingly aloof but a kid nonetheless.

That boy wasn't the worst part of it; he got adopted by his older cousin and became an absolute whiz in a wheelchair. The couple, they had their own place to stay, so I didn't even worry about them. What was awful was how many of my classmates' direct relatives were on that plane, and dealing with the resulting angst in the room. A few times I could nearly swear they knew, why I jumped a little every time someone mentioned the tragedy and why the survivors kept insisting there was a fourth that vanished before help could arrive. But they didn't.

Nothing really happened after that incident. It was a quiet, pleasant summer, no crazy deaths or disasters. I celebrated my birthday alone in a theatre, watching my own pirated movies on the screen and eating Timbits by the dozen. Same thing on the 1st of July. The murders were as distant as ever, and work—it still messed with me, but days came easier. Breaking down on the job was an old nightmare.

Whatever suspicions people had, I didn't let them bother me. Maybe I should have.


	9. Shakespeare Was a Sadist

Here's where things got a little complicated: several weeks into Grade 10, and a few days before the two-year anniversary of my sudden awakening, Marx and another Reaper were sent to help with a huge incident a few settlements over, and—I was really starting to get used to this—I was the only one free for another assignment. Specifically, a single-victim car crash. I had nothing better to do that day and that soul wasn't going to reap itself, so I printed off the file, grabbed my things, and headed out.

Michael, that was his name, he was swerving down the entire street, and watching him finally veer into a wall was the strangest thing. The vehicle was beyond salvation the moment it hit, but Michael—well, he took a little longer than that. Several minutes of pointless fighting, smashing his fists against the collapsed metal and recoiling at each new flame that found its way to his face. I just waited. Waited and then headed over, cutting open an access route to his soul and leaving as soon as I went over his Record. And that was it.

Days passed and I found myself back in school. Monday was miserably rainy and the kind of foreboding I felt that morning, it wasn't what deaths gave me, but there was something wrong and I knew it. But I paid no mind. In retrospect, that was almost certainly a mistake, a very _bad_ mistake to what I'd figured out over the years, but the brooding, immortal teenager in me simply didn't care.

How accurate my empathy was these days, I didn't know, but the anger I felt coming into the building was stronger than I could've ever expected from any student. Raw and burning, something more like what Elliot would give off on a bad day. I felt it from everyone, but the kids in my own first period class were the worst. When I walked into class, everyone immediately turned—and I mean everyone. An article from the local news was up on the projector, along with several different shots of the same face, all fuzzy. Suspicious person, they wrote. Seen around several crime scenes.

"Late again," someone muttered. "What was it this time?"

"I slept through the alarm," I answered, indignant. "What do you think I was doing?"

"That's you, isn't it?"

"What?" I took another look at the article. "Oh—what the _fuck?!_ "

David— _Cunty,_ I still called him that—he always considered me a freak in general, but it only got worse after graduating. Whether he'd seen me at one too many funerals or he could just feel the energy coming off me, I didn't know, but the suspicions he carried with him made him right dangerous. Today was no different, I realized when he stood up and knocked me to the ground before I could even react.

"David—David, man, chill," I huffed, struggling a little under his weight. "Gimme a second to explain, would you?"

Part of me was glad my glasses bounced off in the impact; I could only imagine the kind of expression he had on in that moment. I was scared, but more of having to fight him than actually getting hurt. Chances were, I wouldn't be able to hold back, and I didn't even want to think about what might happen then.

"Little bitch," he said, fist raised in the air. "You think I'll believe you?"

"Believe me about what? That I'm not a fucking _murderer?_ "

He didn't answer. His hand was still up and I saw him quiver for a moment, and then—

I blinked. Just a little blink and he was nearly motionless, along with everyone and everything else. One hand reached out and replaced my specs, and the other pushed me up off the floor and out of his line of sight. I took a deep breath and glanced back at his frozen form. I could've let him at my face—he hardly would've broken anything, and even if he did, it would've healed in no time. But I didn't.

I took a long, deep breath and looked around, gaze falling on the article again. Botched invisibility, I figured. That was the only real possibility. Never once did I stop to double-check that I was as unnoticeable as I should've been, and it was only a matter of time before it would come back to bite me. That was now. The shock must've thrown off my focus, because within seconds I was back to a regular flow of time. David's fist collided with the floor and all I could think about was how stupid I was for reacting like that, for letting my instincts take over.

All he did was stare at me, wide-eyed horror against my flat stupor.

I could've said something, tried to talk him out of whatever he was thinking. But I didn't. I frowned and simply walked out the door, down the halls and out the building, where I sat down in the freezing rain in a vague and awful attempt to clear my head. God knows how much time passed like that before I heard voices behind me, and I turned. One by one, my class walked out, our teacher and several others who'd heard the commotion along with them.

David was near the front of the crowd, blue eyes cold as ever. He took a few steps forward and stopped in front of me, and I gave a wry smile.

"What the hell was that?"

"You were going to punch me, man. I panicked."

"Don't be a wiseass—that thing you did back there, what the _fuck?_ "

I pondered his question, chuckled a little in a weak attempt to lighten the mood. "Short answer? Time manipulation. Made myself move faster than everything else so I could dodge the hit. Like I said—you freaked me out."

Whatever skepticism he had in him was evidently gone after that incident, and so the next thing he asked was, "What are you?"

To that my reply was an innocent, "I'm human." Part of me really did believe that, but then there were things like my cemetery eyes, the way children stared at me—the kind of things that were impossible to ignore. So then it came as no surprise that no one, not a single person in the crowd lacked that look of furious disbelief, vicious little glares that told me hey, you tried, but did you really think you'd last until Grade 12 before someone noticed? Deep down: nope. Not even a little.

"Really thinks it's like us," David said, head tilting in an almost comical way. "What a load of bullshit."

My face went tight and I lunged, dragging his arms behind his back before I even knew what I was doing. "Call me an 'it' again and I'll break your fucking neck, _Cunty._ I have had it."

A second went by and I loosened my grip, watching him run off into the crowd. The sound of rain against asphalt was all I could hear for miles around and I frowned, waited for someone to break the silence. Well—no one ever did. That task fell upon me alone.

"Shit. Shit, okay. Today was crazy." My frown deepened. "I just—I gotta ask. What the hell happened all of a sudden? You're going off some shady article saying, wow, this guy just happened to be nearby when these people died. He definitely killed them. Is that what's going on?"

"Yeah. Yeah, that's exactly what's going on."

"So that's what you think too," I said, absently scanning the crowd for the voice's origin.

"That's what the entire school thinks!" That was someone else. "That's what the police station thinks, it's what _everyone_ thinks! Why else would you always be nearby when shit like this happens?"

"Oh—jeez, that's a long story." I recoiled a little in spite of myself. "I was sending them off. Reaping their souls, Death-style."

"What?"

"Yeah, like, Scythe and all that, making sure they reached the afterlife. I didn't fucking kill them and honestly, I'm cracking up inside right now, just thinking that you guys actually believe that. That you even think I'm that kind of person. So then—yes, David, you're right. I'm not a human. I'm a Reaper. Got the job a few years ago and I guess I just sucked at hiding it. That's all there is to it."

A long chorus of mutters sounded in the crowd, and I waited, fiddled with my brooch until they finally died down.

"So now I'm just thinking, well, I probably can't come here anymore, can I? That'd be awkward for all of us, knowing your classmate has your age of death down like the back of their hand." I gave a wry laugh. "Good luck on the exams, and uh... bye."

That was the last thing I said before heading off, and likely last thing I'd say to any of them in a very long time. I quietly walked the ten minutes home and warped into my bedroom, where I set to work stuffing clothes, money, and some personal possessions into my backpack. When that was done, I took a few minutes to write a note saying this:

 _A lot is going on and I need some time away from here. I'm safe and have a place to stay, and it won't be forever. Love you. Sorry._

I placed it on my pillow, tidied the room a little, and then left the same way I came in. I was sick and tired and goddamn, I was _scared._ Scared what would happen if I stayed. What they'd say to me. Running away sure as hell wasn't the answer, but maybe it would help me find it.

Topsy was sitting under my window with her tail wagging when I came out. I stopped to hug her, and said, "I'm dealing with a lot of stuff and I have to leave for a while. I wish I could take you with me, but it gets pretty dangerous sometimes, and I don't want you to get hurt. I'll try to visit."

She sniffed, said something like, _"Why, though?"_

"'Dunno." I shook my head. "People here don't like having non-humans like me around, I guess. They fear the unknown. Hopefully I can come back once everything's sorted, but for now, there's really no other option. I'll miss you, buddy."

A long ten minutes passed with me scratching her back and letting her slobber over my hands, the kind of things I wouldn't be content going without for who knows how long. I would've spent much longer there, but pretty soon I heard a car pulling into the driveway, and I panicked. So one last little kiss and that was it. I was gone.

 **O O O**

There was something oddly comforting about the cold, endless expanse of the district base. The flat greys of the buildings, the ring of mountains at the edge. It was too big, too quiet. It gave the feeling of a post-apocalypse world. But there was something calming within that. Familiar.

The sky was the same perpetual robin's egg, and the garden was still there, kept alive by a series of invisible sprinklers trailing from the fountain. Wildflowers—some pink, some blue, some a mix of colours. And some of them, as I could distantly recall from stray personal research, symbolized exactly the kind of bullshit that could be expected in a place like this. Death and old memories and forgiveness—whoever picked them out must have thought they were being pretty clever. Nah.

Marx's apartment became my new home for the next week. I slept on his couch, wrapped in an old, magenta blanket I nabbed from home. Whatever happened those few days, there wasn't a single assignment out for me—not one. I didn't have homework or the courage to talk to my parents, either, so most of what I did was just typing up nonsensical Google searches on my laptop, things I didn't really expect to find answers to. How to deal with a situation like mine.

I had no doubts it was obvious something was wrong. But if anyone noticed, they didn't say anything, or else they just didn't care. Elliot and Marx were the only ones who knew the whole story, and while William had his own very blatant suspicions, he didn't probe.

Sometimes I expected Elliot to come over and play therapist again. Part of me hoped he would, knowing he was far better at it than any professional. But the few times he showed up at work that week—that _month,_ he seemed worse than I'd ever seen him, always face tight and a bottle of eighty percent in his lap like no big deal. Leaving without a word when someone tried to talk to him, not even bothering with his usual antics. The general consensus was yeah, this kind of thing did happen sometimes, but it was definitely rare. Very little made it past his wall of snark.

Two weeks had passed since the incident at school, and that was when he really just broke down completely. Huddled close to a Reaper I didn't know, tried very visibly to calm himself a little, and when that didn't work, just started crying. Bawled his fucking eyes out. Elliot was like that for hours, never quite letting up completely, and I'm sure that any other day, he would've gotten the very same reprovals he always did for not working. But if there's one good thing that comes out of a society built on suicide, it's sympathy. No one had the heart; someone simply filled in for him, and that was that.

Elliot, though, didn't return the next day, nor the day after. Marx called sometime around the fourth day and understood that he was still alive and well, but chances were I wouldn't be seeing him for a while. Alone time was usually what worked best for Elliot in cases like this, he said, and if that meant a week, a month away from everything, so be it. It was usually better than the alternatives.

Still more time went by and I was assigned a job; eight people, all killed by fatal headshots. Someone somewhere had found a way to rent out an empty building downtown and host a party, and another someone would open fire on the crowd. That was four days from now.

Shootings were a ludicrously rare occurrence for miles around and the casualties never went over a person or two, so I was definitely surprised, but I didn't question it. I went home—whatever the hell home was at that point—and waited. Some of that time was spent reading up on the victims and seeing what work could be done beforehand. Most of it was playing slashers against a soundtrack of classic rock.

I couldn't sleep that night and I couldn't sleep the next. A consistent and bitterly familiar paranoia kept me up into the mornings, and it was that very last night, a few hours before the incident, that I made my way down to the lounge and began to brew some coffee. I drank it as it was, without watering it down or waiting for it to cool. Straight from the pot, in fact. And then I made more, and thought about what absolute bullshit it was that graveyard shifts—pun fully intended—existed in a society where sleep remained a fundamental necessity for unspecified reasons. I kept wondering as I went into the bathroom and dunked my head in cold water, and as I stared unblinking into my own eyes. If the rumours about my strength were true—and as far as I knew, they were—then I imagined I'd be able to last at least somewhat longer without sleep than most. But the marks were definitely beginning to show. The lights I could always see shifting inside were sparser and slower, and the green wasn't as bright. Small things, but I still worried a little about my condition and exactly how far I was from my prime.

It rained hard that night. Against the police lights and fogged-up moon, it was a sight to behold, and behold I did. Between souls, I took all the time I could to just sit and watch. But there was no calm, no bliss, no lack of worries; none of the things I felt when it rained.

Just paranoia.

By then it was clear there was something more, and I tried to think up a possibility, but nothing sat right. No one seemed suicidal and the only energy for miles around was that of my own Death Scythe. No demons, no other Reapers. Nothing.

I was already exhausted and nearly numb with cold, and that fear was a supremely unwelcome addition to the mix. Fact was, I'd planned on sleeping in the lobby, knowing full well I wouldn't endure a second trip through the storm. But if that paranoia was still there after the reaping, well—something about spending the night alone just didn't seem right. So I slowly packed up, warping away everything but my weapon, and waved my hand.

Nothing happened.

It took a moment for the implications to set in, and when they did, I panicked. I hissed a little prayer and tried again, but the space in front of me remained the same as ever. There wasn't even a trace of energy.

It became obvious then that I would need to travel on foot, and so reluctantly, I headed off. I kept my Scythe in the palm of my hand and I made an effort to stay in the light, but the streets were empty. The buildings were dark and I couldn't see any cars for miles around. Maybe that should've been a sign, but all I did in response was tighten my grip on the brooch and keep walking.

About fifteen minutes in, I heard a huge splash behind me. I turned abruptly and stared into the darkness, but I saw nothing other than the faint flicker of a streetlight and the continuously pounding rain against the sidewalk—nothing that could have caused such a loud sound. I almost raised an eyebrow, and then slowly turned back around.

Not even a second passed before I heard it again.

At this point, I was thoroughly convinced that I was being followed, and when I looked behind me, one of the puddles was still giving off waves—and I convinced myself that maybe it was just a fox, or the wind had picked up and dropped something. Maybe it was just the paranoia. So, reluctantly, I turned around and kept walking.

Big mistake.

I'd barely taken another step when a hand suddenly clamped over my mouth, and I didn't have time to react before I was shoved into the alley to my right. I slammed head-first into the wet concrete, where the frames of my glasses jabbed me in the face and something split my bottom lip, and I barely kept from crying out. Fixing my specs with one hand, I slowly wobbled back onto my feet and turned.

His face was far from the light and underneath his hood, I could tell he had his hair tied back, but I recognized him at once. There was one thing he couldn't hide and it was more than enough to clue me in. I'd memorized it years ago.

"Elliot. You fucking cunt."

There was a long silence before he suddenly replied, a flustered, "How'd you know?"

"Your soul."

He sighed and pulled his hood down. "Was hoping this'd be easy, but I guess not." He frowned a little. "How are you, Johan?"

"'How am I?' Is that a serious question? You just shoved me into the fucking ground."

He went quiet.

I was ready to blame his behaviour on all the whiskey, but that wouldn't do—he seemed sober as could possibly be, and in fact, Marx had once said that was when Elliot was at his most unpredictable. And... Oh my God. The paranoia I'd been having, the paranoia that hadn't gone away after I reaped tonight's souls—only when I noticed that it was getting stronger by the second did I finally come to a terrifying conclusion: it was me. I was foretelling my own death. Holy shit.

Slowly, I took a step back. And another. "Fuck you," I hissed, trying to hide the fear in my voice.

That was when his face suddenly darkened, and he rammed me into a wall.

"Let's talk," he hissed, narrowing his eyes at me. There was a flash of metal and a sudden pain in my left shoulder, like a bolt of lightning. Elliot pinned me by my chest, kept me from moving as he slowly tore into my arm, and my sleeve along with it. Searing hot pain shot through me, and I screamed, trying to push him away with my other arm.

The gash was down to my elbow when I finally managed to kick him off. I stumbled back in agony, tightly clutching my arm and feeling every torn muscle like a thousand knives ripping me apart.

"Let's not," I coughed out.

"I'm not giving you a choice." His eyes flashed a little, and I flinched.

It was in that moment's pause that I was able to catch his Death Scythe's appearance; something that I could only describe as a pair of shears or something, with a series of intricate designs on the metal and a painful looking serrated edge on one of the blades. But a moment's pause was all I had—I had to roll sideways to avoid another sudden attack.

I ran for a few metres, giving myself some much-needed breathing space and a chance to draw up my own weapon. I held it in the best defensive grip I could manage, right in front of my chest.

"Elliot," I said, eyes locked on his Scythe. "Don't do this. Please."

He frowned again, gave a tight, regretful look, and slowly answered, "No."

And with that, he charged, slamming his blade into mine with an earsplitting screech.

It was in that very same instant that we met eyes, and all I saw was anger. No rhyme, no reason that I could make out, just anger of the purest form. And my only thought was—

He lied.

Elliot is

a dirty

fucking

liar.

I yelped as he gave a sudden push, tried to parry as best I could. His attacks were random, seemingly unfocused, and it quickly became apparent that the only thing keeping me alive at this point was luck.

It was hardly a few seconds before he landed a hit, sawing crudely through my other arm. Elliot yanked the blade out with a shower of blood. A heavy dose of adrenaline wasn't enough—I still felt most of the blow. And it showed. My legs spasmed and my vision shot to black for a moment, but I forced myself to fight, even as my eyes filled with tears.

"Liar," I choked, propping myself up with the sword. "I fucking trusted you."

To that he said nothing, only lifted his Scythe again; I immediately leapt up and slammed my weapon against his, trying to disarm him. I pushed harder, gripping with two hands, but he remained steadfast.

"Call me what you want. I don't care. I don't _bloody_ care."

He knocked me back and went for my shins, but I sprung at the last second, leaving me with a deep slash on my upper thigh instead. I grunted and shoved him away with the flat of my sword, rolled when he charged again. I took my opening, slicing into the back of his legs, and I saw him flinch, but in seconds he was back up and resuming his barrage of attacks.

"Damn you," he hissed suddenly, smacking me in the face. I heard a dull clatter behind me and felt my breath catch.

I had no chance of dodging as his Scythe tore into my side, releasing a huge spray of blood. I dropped my weapon and stumbled back, nauseous from the sheer agony. It was too much. In the corner of my eye, I swore I saw Elliot smile wickedly before elbowing me in the stomach. I coughed sharply, tasting blood in my mouth right before I was shoved into the concrete. I tried to move, but it was no use. I was pinned.

"Fighting dirty," I growled. "Really? Fucking _really,_ Elliot. I can't believe you."

Elliot ignored me entirely, saying, "There's a certain high you get when you're this close to death. You know what I'm talking about, don't you?"

I did.

I thought back to all those hours spent looking up suicide methods on the internet. All those times I was home alone and could've easily headed out and hung myself on a tree somewhere. Burned a stack of charcoal in a sealed room. And when those weren't options anymore, all the times I was a hair away from calling Marx, begging him to just reap me because I was so sick of the pain. All those times I _wanted_ to die.

This wasn't that kind of time.

"You're sick," I growled, struggling against his grip. "What the hell's your problem, even?!"

"My problem?" Elliot leaned in close, flipping his weapon into a reverse grip and hovering it over a particularly dangerous spot in my chest. "You. You're my problem."

"So you're going to kill me? Fine. Do it, you fucking coward. Kill me!"

"Nah. Not yet."

"What?"

"Oh, we're just getting started, kiddo."

My breath hitched. "No," I said. "No no no no no. Elliot, no. Please."

But Elliot ignored me, chuckling a little as he continued, _"You and I are going to have a nice, long chat," emphasizing each word, scraping at my shirt with the blade_ _. Doing everything he could to make sure I was terrified._

 _I tried to wriggle my leg free, see if I could knee him in the balls or something, but he must've been using every ounce of his strength to keep me there. Oh—oh fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. I couldn't do this. I was going to die. I was going to_ _die._ _I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to calm myself down. I was going to—_

 _—Clang!_

A second passed.

Then another.

I waited a bit longer. Still nothing.

When I realized I wasn't being tortured to death, I opened my eyes. Elliot was still close enough that I could make out his figure without my glasses, and all I saw on his face was a blank stare. His left hand was covered in red and his weapon was—my gaze shot to the side. Pinned to the ground. Pinned by—

William.

It wasn't the Scythe that gave it away, or the voice; it was the calm I felt in that moment, the way his soul worked me over like a shot of morphine. How just his presence was enough to lessen the pain a little.

What I managed to determine then was that William immediately retracted his Scythe, sliding down with it and landing on Elliot's head just as he turned to see what was going on. I yelped and crawled back a few inches right before he slammed into the ground in front of me with a sickening crack.

William leapt up off Elliot and landed a few metres behind him, clicking his Scythe back into its default length as he did. Elliot's own was hurled into the concrete, spinning a few times before settling with a dull clatter.

He wobbled to his feet, muttered a string of curses before screaming out, "The hell was that?!"

"That? I was in the area when I noticed you two, and decided to step in," William answered flatly.

"In the area? Wha—this isn't even your district, for crying out loud!"

"Nor is it yours."

"But I—" Elliot cut off abruptly, clearly struggling for a comeback.

"I see I was right to suspect you, Luunford," William continued, hatred edging his words. He gave me what seemed like a deeply apologetic glance—I couldn't quite tell. "Now, Johannes! I'll explain everything later. Just keep out of my way for a moment, please."

Too startled to question him, I crawled over to the side and leaned against a dumpster, leaving a trail of blood in my wake. I cringed as my arm brushed against the steel.

"... Of all the people," I heard Elliot say, a tremble to his voice. "Damn you, Spears. D... Damn you."

He seemed ready to make a break for it, but like hell William would let him run away. He wasn't that kind of guy. He finished things.

And then—just as Elliot took a step back, William suddenly leapt forward, piercing cleanly through his arm in a single blow. He froze instantly; I had a similar reaction.

"Listen to me," he hissed, pulling his weapon out with a gush of blood. "Any other day, I might have given you another chance, but you... have gone too far this time."

And he shoved his Scythe right into the centre of his chest.

There was no gasp, no cry of pain; just a blinding flash of light as both the blade and part of the shaft were pushed through, right to the other side. I didn't know how long it lasted for them, but on my side, it was something like half a minute before his record finally seemed to be coming to an end. Elliot coughed.

"You. Fuck you," he wheezed, with the most intense hatred I'd ever heard in my life.

William glared coldly at him. "Likewise."

With that, the last of the light flooded into his Scythe, and the remaining glow in Elliot's eyes vanished. William stopped, gave a weak, shaky sigh before finally pulling his weapon out, leaving him to topple limply to the ground. All I could hear was the heavy rain that continued to pound the concrete.

Slowly, he walked over and picked up my glasses, wiping off the muck before sliding them onto my face. I only stared, dazed.

"I'm sorry I couldn't come sooner."

"Fucking _perfectionist,_ " I coughed out, grinning a little. "I don't care. You saved my life."

William nodded distantly, placing his Death Scythe to the side. "I'll carry you."

"W-where?"

"The hospital?" He raised an eyebrow.

"But—" My sentence gave way to a sudden coughing fit, and I stumbled to my knees.

"Wha—Johannes!"

I stopped breathing, trying to lessen the blows, but there was no change. I was sprawled on the ground before I knew it, choking on blood and vomit, vision static. Fading in and out. Until—

—it stopped, stayed fogged up where my glasses were and clear where they weren't.

Like my powers were gone, nothing there to hinder my eyesight anymore.

Like I was human again, just a normal fucking human.

Like I was dying.


	10. Rock and a Hard Place

_AN: HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEY FOLKS IT'S finally done. oof. idk this might be a little off because I settled towards the end but enjoy y'all_

* * *

Somewhere between life and death is a terrifying state known as _limbo._ I'm not talking about Purgatory—I mean before that, before your soul has been released from your body, before you've even been allowed the morbid pleasure of viewing your own cinematic record. It's a hellish place with no concept of sight, no concept of sound, nor taste, touch, or smell; just you and a storm of alarming thoughts that increase in intensity with every second that passes. Quiet and easily ignored only for as long as it takes you to realize the gravity of your situation, and then—

Then you wake up. Or, at least, you wake up as much as you can, which in my case meant an embarrassingly pathetic attempt at fluttering open my eyelids, and then a slow, unfocused look at my surroundings to try and figure out what was going on, since whatever context I had to my situation before was completely gone. Through the buzzing in my ears and black spots in my vision, what I eventually managed to determine was that my nose was bleeding, my side felt like someone had thrown a bucket of acid on it, and I was being carried by a terrified-looking William.

I don't remember what I said, or if it was even coherent, but his reply was a very stern, "You'll be fine, Johannes. I'll make sure of that."

And that was it. I was back under in seconds.

 **O O O**

"—tear up his whole body trying to take his clothes off like that! For Christ's sake, just use the shears!"

"It's soaking right through! I need more bandages, hurry!"

"She—"

 _She. She she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she she—_

I fucked up so bad.

 **O O O**

"Johannes—Calm down, look at me! You're safe now. It's okay."

My body burned and all I could see was William, standing next to me with unkempt hair and a layer of sweat down his forehead. I was in a bed. A hospital. I immediately reached for my chest, panicked when I touched fat.

"No," I hissed. "No no no no no. _Fuck!_ "

"Listen to me, stop! You're hyperventilating!" I felt him grab my hand and froze. "Breathe. Please."

William's fingers around mine were all I could process in that moment. I wanted to tell him no, you're wrong, it's not okay—scream it as loudly as I possibly could. But nothing would come out.

It was a very long, very painful minute before he said, "Tell me what's wrong."

"I tried to," I answered, closing my eyes. "Right before I lost consciousness. What I didn't get the chance to say was I'm scared. I'm scared what'll happen when they undress me."

At that, he fell silent. He knew. Of course he did; with how stubborn he could be, he'd probably refused to leave the room and stayed with me the entire time, and undoubtedly he would've seen me naked at some point. Bloody, beaten, and—

"I'm sorry."

That was all he said. It was a very long time before either of us spoke again, and I took that time to examine my body, to try and figure out exactly how bad everything was. I was down to my favourite teal boxer-briefs and a loose surgical top, and whatever skin was visible beneath the bandages was pale and covered in bruises. An IV stuck out of my right arm and my left was in a sling.

"Which hospital is this?"

The question seemed to take him by surprise. "Th-the one in your district."

"Oh, Christ. Everyone's going to know."

"No—no, you're wrong. No one will ever find out, Johannes. I'll make sure of that."

"Promise me, Mr. Spears. Maybe you don't understand, maybe you never will, but I'm happy like this. I'm happy with people never being sure what I am because they only see the things I've done and the kind of person I am inside. They don't judge me for what's in my pants, and I don't want to lose that. So promise me, please."

"I swear it."

I wasn't sure if I wanted to laugh or cry.

William always felt like the kind of guy who, if and when he learned that part of me, would be pushed away. Repulsed in some form or another, with a side of him that would always see me as a dirty faggot, or a confused little freak, or some other negativity in the world. Dealing with that possibility terrified me, and after all those days locked in the bathroom, bawling my eyes out, hating the thought of being rejected by someone I loved so dearly—that kind of answer just didn't feel real.

I never mentioned this to him.

"What happened after I passed out?"

"I panicked."

"You panicked?"

"I thought you were dead."

His gaze drifted to my side, and then to each shoulder, and then back to my face. There were stitches there, too. They tugged at my cheek whenever I spoke, from a little below my eye to the edge of my jaw. I didn't remember the blow and I was scared to know what else I'd missed. Terrified. But I asked anyway.

William didn't spare the details; "Eight stabs," he said. "Twice as many cuts. Some of them reached bone. Your side was so damaged you needed two separate grafts just so it could be sewn shut."

"How am I alive, Mr. Spears?"

"I don't know," he answered, eyes dulling. "I truly don't."

A very distant part of me wondered if it was still something to do with my strength, if I was really powerful enough to survive wounds like I did. Even to a Reaper, even without getting at the soul, Death Scythes were no joke. The kind of transcending power contained in them cancelled out most forms of invincibility and immortality and in that way, injuries tended to be universal in their effects on the victim. Fatal to a human? Fatal to a Reaper, most likely. So it seemed to me—and William, judging by his expression—that my survival was just a cosmic fluke. One giant, bloody fluke. If there was ever a reason to believe that something out there was keeping me safe, this was it. God himself or just William, I wasn't really sure. Maybe both.

I never asked about Elliot or what became of his body, and William didn't seem keen on bringing it up himself. It scared me to even think about him, and if I weren't on so many painkillers, I might've just thrown up then and there. And still— _still_ , part of me missed him, that same man who set off my fight-or-flight every time we crossed paths, who would've left me nothing but blood and bones if he'd gotten his way. I still fucking missed him. I didn't want to think about that either.

"How long am I gonna be here?"

"A month, maybe more. I can't say for sure."

I frowned. "How did you know about last night?"

"Signs. I've had years to learn Luunford's, and when he suddenly disappeared like that, I just knew. I was following him for weeks. But..."

"'But'?"

"He's clever. Was. Those last few days, he noticed, and I lost him. I knew he was close to you and that was the only lead I had, so I found your most recent assignment and the rest—the rest was luck."

"I felt it. My death. I should've _listened,_ not gone out alone like I did. Marx, I was gonna call him, but I didn't want to wake him up, and look where that got me."

"And if you did? There would've been another day," he said, eyes flashing. "You simply can't control these things, Johannes, and I need you to understand that none of this is on you."

That should've been obvious. But as I sat there replaying the fight in my head, eyes locked on my bruised knees and a sour taste in my mouth, all I could think was how wrong he was. How fucking _wrong._ I didn't mention this either, for fear of upsetting him even more. William definitely tried to hide it, but it was clear as day—in the turbulence of his aura and the shadows under his eyes, in the tightness of his shoulders and the way he held his hand, open-palmed and facing where he'd leaned our Scythes against the wall. Poised to strike.

"My bag is still at Marx's place," I blurted. "There's things in there to keep me busy. If you could—if you could bring it, that'd be great. Shit, sorry. I just—it was just a quick assignment, I didn't think I'd need it. Sorry."

"You apologize too much."

"Oh, fuck. Sor—I'll t-try to s-s-stop."

William forced a smile. "Get some rest."

"Number thirty—"

"Thirty-seven. I know."

He left before I could muster a thank you, taking his Death Scythe in one hand and closing the door behind him. With his absence came a disheartening silence that shattered my calm and left me acutely aware of everything wrong with the room. The walls hurt my eyes and the antiseptic in the air burned and I was scared. So scared. William was as much a healer as he was a protector, it felt. His soul had that kind of quality. But I guess no matter how strong it was, whatever kind of catharsis he could offer through proximity alone—I guess there was an area of effect. Step outside and it just fades away.

I fell asleep cowering under the sheets.

 **O O O**

The only trace of William when I woke was the black backpack perched on the bedside table, with a neatly handwritten note stuck to the front;

 _Please don't hesitate to call if something arises._

Under that was his cell. I frowned and reached over to where my phone was charging, pulling up the contacts with a few swipes. William, no picture, added immediately to speed dial—and then straight to my bag's contents. The main compartment held my schoolwork, a science magazine, a recently-bought sketchbook, my headphones, and my laptop. Then there were the gags I'd added years ago, namely a Magic 8-Ball, a pack of novelty playing cards, and a Swiss Army knife. The front held my journal and a compact mirror.

My frown deepened.

I pulled out the mirror and flipped it open, and took a long look at my face. I was about three shades paler than usual and my eyes were a deep, muddy green, and one of the stitches on my cheek looked like it'd popped. A few of my front teeth had pieces missing.

I snapped the mirror shut and sighed.

It was then that the door opened and a nurse strolled in, wheeling a medical cart with her. I immediately tensed up.

"Oh, you're awake." She smiled a little. "That's good."

"Yeah. Yeah, I just woke up ten minutes ago, something like that."

"How do you feel?"

"Honestly? Like shit. Can't imagine what it would be like without the painkillers," I said, glancing at the drip bag.

"Right." Her smile loosened. "I need to change your bandages, kiddo. That okay?"

"Yeah. Yeah, of course. Why?"

"Well—" She broke off, gave a look like she was deep in thought. "The other day, when Spears brought you in—"

"The other day?"

"Oh, yeah. You slept a full twenty-four hours that first night, give or take. I can't imagine how exhausted you were after all that."

I frowned. "The other day, then. What happened?"

"You kept waking up during prep, screaming about how we couldn't undress you. You were just hysterical, I mean—it was almost unconscious."

"That's probably why I don't remember," I said, frown deepening at the image. "Yeah, it's fine. I'm fine. I'm just... shy. Really fucking shy. I get panic attacks."

"Are you having one right now?"

I didn't answer.

"I'll be quick. Just breathe."

She carefully slid off my gown and started to unravel the old, blood-soaked bandages. The pads tumbled onto the bed and I immediately chanced a look at each of my wounds. They were all skilfully sewn and didn't look like much at the right angle, but the deep bruises and scabbed-over scrapes surrounding them told a different story. My side was still undoubtedly the worst, with the crisscrossed rows of stitches and pale, mesh-like skin across its length. Parts were still oozing.

I blocked out the rest of the process and didn't wake back up until she started repacking.

"I heard a bit," she said, flipping the lid off a biohazard bin. "About what happened."

"The fight?"

She nodded. "I can't know what you're going through right now, but just surviving that night tells me you're strong, stronger than I've ever seen. Whatever happens, you'll be alright."

She made a very legitimate point, but under all the weight of my thoughts, I just couldn't bring myself to believe her. I couldn't get over that primal fear or the way Elliot kept looking at me, thirst and anger and every other awful thing all mixed into one. I couldn't get over everything I knew I was burying, whatever parts my mind knew would just shatter me entirely in the kind of state I was in right now. Those black spots scared me just as much as everything else.

I humoured her, though, said I'd make sure to remember her words and watched as she tossed the last of her tools onto the cart and left the room with a convinced smile on her face. I didn't want to worry her, same as I didn't want to worry William or anyone else.

A minute passed staring into nothing before I sighed and did what I always did when I was stressed. I went back to bed. It was early, way too early, but I was exhausted enough that I just couldn't bring myself to care; I didn't even bother taking off my glasses.

The next few days weren't much different. I slept for hours on end and woke every once in a while when I needed to get cleaned up, and that was it. I didn't have anything in me other than the drip, so I didn't have to worry about bathroom breaks, and nothing was really hurting, but I was still so numb and tired that I couldn't do anything to entertain myself when I was awake other than listen to music. Suffice to say it got boring quick.

It was the fifth day when I was finally allowed to eat solid foods, and the seventh when I could walk for short distances without help. But something about that—if it was the drip I had to push around with me, or the unfamiliar way my clothes hung off me—something about that just reminded me of everything about where I was. So I still mostly stayed in bed.

 **O O O**

Friday morning—well, my morning, most people's afternoon. Whatever.

 **William said - Today at 7:16 AM**

Are you well? I'm sorry I can't visit.

 **You said - Today at 12:04 PM**

I'm getting better

 **You said – Today at 12:05 PM**

I still can't really move and I get flashbacks sometimes but there's steady progress

 **William said - Today at 12:09 PM**

Do your parents know about what happened?

That one caught me off guard.

I wasn't exactly AWOL, but there was a lot left unsaid in the note, like how long I was going to be gone and just why I was leaving in the first place. The plan was to tell them within a few weeks max, but that clearly wasn't possible now.

My phone was charging in the power outlet above the bedside table, in pristine, untouched condition ever since that fateful night. I cursed myself for never telling my parents the number—or that I even _had_ a cell phone. I could've immediately told them what had happened, where I'd run off to, why. I could've called them to come pick me up, made sure I didn't have to walk home with someone on my trail. This whole thing could've probably been avoided if I hadn't been so damn stupid. Was this my punishment for tempting fate?

I took a deep breath and tugged it out of the dock. I waited for the screen to load and tapped the phone icon. Then I went to contacts.

Dad. I didn't know his cell, didn't even know if he was at his office at that moment to pick up, but I didn't care. I had to do this.

My hands were shaking.

Another deep breath and I pressed _call_.

Dial tone.

Then his away message; _"_ _... but please leave your name and number, and I'll get back to you as soon as possible."_

Beep.

"Hello? It's—" I stopped, bit down hard on my tongue. "It's me. I just wanted to let you know that I'm okay. Whatever the school told you, something happened that forced me to leave for the time being. You're probably freaking out, wondering what the hell could have possibly made me think running away was the only option, but trust me when I say I had a good reason. You should also know that I was in an accident a few days ago. I'm safe, I'm not in critical condition, but it'll be at least a month before I can leave the hospital. No, I know you're suddenly really excited and thinking about heading to the local hospital to visit me, but it's not that one.

"I have a lot to explain to you and Mom, not just about the last week, but about the past few years as well—and I want to explain it in person. You do understand, right? You're the one that said once that important things are best said to someone's face, not via an electronic device. So, to both of you. Just hang on for a little while. And don't worry."

End call.

 **O O O**

 **William said - Today at 6:37 PM**

I'll make sure to visit tomorrow.

 **You said - Today at 6:39 PM**

thank you, I really appreciate it

 **O O O**

Sunday evening. William and I were making small talk over some orange-raspberry tea he brought in. His brewing skills are godly—but then again, what do you expect from a two-hundred-and-something-year-old Brit?

"How's work?" I asked. "Terrible as usual?"

"I wouldn't quite call it _terrible_ ," he replied, giving a weary smile.

William's smiles were more and more common these days. That time when they were reserved for only the most special moments was hard to imagine now; they were as frequent as anyone else's, and twice as bright and bubbly. Get it right and they'll light up a whole damn room.

I smiled back and took a sip from my tea. "You used to. That means it's improving."

"I suppose so."

Outside the room, I could hear the faint sound of a medical trolley being wheeled down the hall. It was an unmistakable _squeek-clack-squeek_ that I was all too familiar with, and as I listened, I felt that old pang of bittersweetness settle inside me like a five tonne weight. Not just the weight of my own situation, but of everyone else's, of every hospital patient we'd both taken. I think he felt it too.

We were talking for hours before I drifted off, with my glasses still on and an empty mug in hand. It was the first time in years that I had fallen asleep in such a pleasant mood.

 **O O O**

 **William said - Today at 8:02 AM**

How are you feeling?

 **You said - Today at 2:58 PM**

pretty good tbh, I'm off pain meds and I can walk around on my own

 **You said – Today at 3:00 PM**

my nurse said if this continues I might be out by a week or two

 **William said - Today at 3:07 PM**

I'm glad to hear that.

 **O O O**

Tuesday brought nothing but nightmares.

I was still choking back tears when I grabbed my phone and pulled up the messages. Nothing new. I wanted to ask for some advice, motivation, but nothing came. Just this:

 **You said - Today at 7:01 AM**

elliot is a cunt

 **William said - Today at 7:08 AM**

Do you need me to come over?

 **You said - Today at 7:08 AM**

no don't please I don't want to drag you out of work

 **You said - Today at 7:09 AM**

I just need to vent or something don't come please

 **You said - Today at 7:10 AM**

please I'm just gonna be a ducking nuisance

 **You said - Today at 7:10 AM**

*fucking

 **You said - Today at 7:10 AM**

FUCK I'm spamming you please don't be mad I'm sorry

 **William said - Today at 7:11 AM**

I'm coming over.

 **You said - Today at 7:12 AM**

william no it's already fucking enough that saved my life I don't need that

 **You said - Today at 7:12 AM**

*******mr spears fuck why am I calling you by your first name

 **William said - Today at 7:13 AM**

You can call me whatever you want, Johannes. That's not important right now. I'm coming.

 **You said - Today at 7:13 AM**

WILLIAM no don't you fucking dare I don't need you getting in trouble because of me please

 **You said - Today at 7:14 AM**

william

 **You said - Today at 7:14 AM**

don't

 **You said - Today at 7:15 AM**

please answer william just stay at work please

And then the door opened.

The look on William's face when he walked in was one so sorrowful and pitying that it sent a shiver down my spine. He didn't say a word as he sloughed off his bag and left it against the bed, or as he sat next to me with little more than a few inches between us. He just quietly held my gaze and waited for me to speak.

I was still reeling.

"Hey. Hi." I took a deep breath. "Jesus Christ, William. You didn't have to do this. You didn't have to fucking do this."

"No, I didn't," he said, eyes lightening somewhat. "But I'm here. Talk to me, Johannes. Please."

I felt terrible for making him go through this. I felt terrible for leaving my parents waiting for the newspaper to confirm some horrible suspicion; terrible for thinking that I could walk home by myself in the middle of the night, thinking that I was strong, that I was fearless, that nothing could ever harm me. I was and still am nothing but a stupid, naïve little kid, a coward and a fake hero—no, a fake person. I'm not smart, not powerful, not as brave as I appear. Hell, all of my best jokes are stolen. Nothing about me is real. Not even my gender; that's what they tell me. There's nothing left. I'm a damn fuck-up.

But I didn't say that.

I didn't.

And yet—

He understood. By the crushing silence that followed his question, the tears that had slowly started welling up in my eyes, he understood. All of it. "Oh, Johannes, you don't deserve this," William began, his voice little more than a whisper. "You don't deserve any of this."

And then he took off my glasses, and I was confused, until I realized he could tell exactly what I was thinking—and so I did just that: I sank into his arms and wept.

 **O O O**

Wednesday.

"I need a haircut," I said, grabbing at my bangs. "It's been months, jeez."

My hair was a little like Marx's; short in the back and a little longer in the front, but without the red. It thinned my face and curled nicely around my glasses, and it helped when I wanted to hide my face, but most days it felt just a little too unlike me. Maybe I was imagining it.

"I think it suits you," William said.

"Yeah?" I frowned. "I dunno. I want to grow it out, I think, but it's in that weird spot right now where I just don't know how to style it. Yours is pretty simple, so I guess you've never dealt with that."

He shrugged.

"Maybe I'll just take a few inches of the front so it grows a little more evenly. Yeah, I think that'll work."

"Do you want to talk about yesterday?"

"I... I don't know." I was rubbing my teeth now, going over each chip and crack with a finger. "I don't really know what to talk about. It's just flashbacks. You know what happened, I know what happened, and I guess I just can't get over it all."

"You seem calmer today."

"I am. It comes and goes—I mean, days like yesterday. It's just trauma. Sometimes there isn't a thing that doesn't set it off, and sometimes I can think back on it no sweat. That's just how it works. Can you check if there any painkillers left in there?" I said, pointing to the bedside table.

He nodded, rummaged in the drawer for a minute before handing me a little clear bottle of pills.

"Are you healing well?"

"I don't know," I said, dumping a rough dozen pills into my hand. "I'd say so. The scars are gonna be fucking awful, though. I'm gonna be thinking about this every time I look at myself. Spells might fix it, but even they have limits. And that scares me a lot, I think. More than it should."

"I can understand that fear," William said, giving a look like maybe he knew what it was like. He probably did.

"I've got my coping mechanisms. They might not be healthy, but I'll sure as hell take them over anything else. Speaking of which, can you pass me that water?"

"I just want you to know," he said, handing me the half-empty cup, "that these memories won't just leave you. Someday, be it next week or in fifty years, you'll need to face them head-on. Keep that in mind and don't forget it, Johannes."

"I won't." I stared down at my hands, brows tight. "I'll do that, but not now. Not today. I'm not strong enough. This thing destroyed me, William. It would be suicide to take it on now."

"Then don't. You know yourself best, and I trust you to properly assess whether or not you can afford the risk right now."

I stopped to take the pills and water and waited.

It took a minute for the painkillers to fully kick in, and another minute to get my things ready; my mirror, propped up on the table, and my Swiss Army knife, flipped open to the pliers and clutched tightly with both hands. I don't know if it was horror or amusement in William's face as he watched me pull each of the damaged teeth out, two of them in one swift motion and the other a little more carefully. I wrapped them in a tissue and tossed them in the trash.

"Look at this. I'm like a fucking six-year-old," I said, giving a wide grin. "Jesus Christ."

"I can't believe you."

"Dude. Dude, don't tell me this isn't at least a little funny. Seriously, look. Look at me, William."

"Yes, I'm—I'm looking. But we have more important things to—"

"Hold on," I said, grabbing a few more tissues and stuffing them in the holes. "Dude, I'm still bleeding. Fuck. Oh. Oh, fuck, I took way too many, hold on. Shit."

Shit shit shit.

Next thing I knew, I was on the floor, pool of red around my face. William was standing over me with a look like he didn't know if he should laugh or scream. Maybe both. But the holes already felt a bit tighter, and a dab of the tongue showed at least one of the teeth was already starting to sprout. So me—I laughed. I laughed until I cried.

"See," I said, glancing up at him, "that wasn't so bad, was it?"

It was a very long, tense moment before he smiled and helped me up, saying, "You truly are a wonder, Johannes."

 **O O O**

Two weeks in, I was fully off painkillers and back to regular meals. Other than the daily checkups, the routine was starting to feel more and more familiar. I'd wake up around 11 and play games on my laptop, take breaks every now and then to watch something from my collection of shows, maybe write something. Go to the bathroom, get a snack, and keep playing until around 10.

William still sent me worried texts. Elliot still haunted my thoughts. My parents—my parents were still terrified, no doubt. But things felt normal.

It was when the last of my stitches were removed that I really started panicking about what I was going to say to Mom and Dad, and how. The day I was discharged was when I'd meet with them, no later. I had that part down. But I didn't know how to tell them about myself. I didn't know how to tell them about what happened.

I didn't know if I would even be able to talk.

William was deeply encouraging, though. So was my nurse. They maintained the very reasonable belief that if I could survive what I did—if I could survive that night—I could survive a conversation. Talking was not spilled blood. It wasn't bruises and broken bones. Misspoken words couldn't kill me, and I tried to keep that in mind as the days ticked by.

No, I could talk.

I could talk.


	11. Don't Fear the Reaper

"I'm out. I'm—I'm out of the hospital." I cleared my throat, staring at my phone. "I'm out of the hospital and—ready. Ready to talk. I'm ready to talk. Come by—meet me—meet me at Starbucks. The one on Main. M-m-meet me at the Starbucks on Main."

Jesus Christ.

"M-m-meet—meet. _Meet_ me. At the Starbucks on Main."

I pressed call and waited. I was sent straight to voicemail and almost cried in relief.

"It's me. I'm out of the hospital," I said, slowly and deliberately. "I'm ready to talk. Meet me at the Starbucks on Main and I'll explain everything."

I ended the call and immediately dropped the phone in my lap, heart racing. I was crouched just outside the building, dressed in my best jeans and a black button-up and cardigan. My Scythe was in a different form this time, clipped between the tips of my collar, and my bag was slung over one shoulder. There was stolen concealer over the scar on my face. I didn't want them to see.

I slid my phone back into my pocket and got up.

Marx was at the counter when I went in, fiddling with the cash register. He glanced up and nearly did a double take.

"You—"

"Me. Hi. I'm alive."

"Johan, Jesus Christ, I thought you were dead. How bad was it?"

"Bad. Scars everywhere. William, did you hear about him? He—he was insane out there, wow. I've never seen anyone so pissed."

"Must count you as a friend," he said, eyebrows raising. "Get on his good side, he'll be loyal to the grave. That takes luck, kiddo."

I smiled a little. "Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Marx got me a cinnamon mocha out of his own pocket, calling it the near-death discount. I picked up my drink and a stir-stick and settled down in one of the window seats near the back.

People stared at me for the longest time, at skin which I swore got paler with every soul reaped, at the frank reminder of my powers lying behind my glasses. I didn't notice when they looked away, and I didn't care. I kept drinking, nervously tapping the side of my cup every now and then. Ages passed like that before I heard a name, and I looked up.

Dad hugged me first; then Mom.

They sat across from me and waited for me to say something. Between the choking atmosphere of the room and the pit in my stomach, I wasn't sure I could. "I'm not human," was how I eventually began, hands clasped at my chest. "I've known for a while now, and it's a bit of a pretext for what happened last month. No hiding it anymore."

Dad furrowed his brows, gave a look like he didn't, couldn't, wasn't going to believe me; Mom did the same. I expected that. Fact was, I'd be a little scared if they immediately accepted my words.

"Not human," he repeated, chuckling softly. "What are you, then?"

"A Reaper. One of many. I help souls cross over."

"A Reaper?" His eyebrows raised a little. "As in the _Grim_ Reaper?"

"Yeah, exactly like that. But like I said: one of many. The Grim Reaper you're probably thinking of? He's the big guy, Death himself. Nowadays, he just sends in the info." I shrugged at that.

Dad shook his head, continuing that haughty little chuckle of his. I heard it often when I was little, when he didn't believe me about things like who started a fight or why a teacher would be mean to me. But he came around. He'd come around this time, too. They both would.

"I saw you born," he said. "I know what you are and it's not the Grim Reaper."

"No." I frowned and took a sip of coffee. "No, you didn't see me born. You saw someone else. That was your real kid. I'm switched at birth."

"You look too much like us," he argued.

"They did that on purpose, my biological parents. They wanted me to have a normal human life, and that worked, didn't it? No one ever suspected anything. But then 8th grade rolled around, and…"

"What happened in 8th grade?"

"My powers kicked in. That kid's death messed with me, told my body to wake up and get going. Fast forward a few weeks and I'm training together with other Reapers after school, learning about ghosts and afterlives and how to take up souls. It was like that for years."

"And we never noticed?"

"You never noticed anything," I said, shrugging. "The dress shirts in my closet, the money I raided for dry cleaning, all the flowers I bought—none of it."

"Okay, hold on. What's a Reaper?"

"Truth? Humans who killed themselves. They go after the dying, sending up soul after soul for judgment, until they're forgiven and allowed into their own afterlife."

"You _killed_ yourself?"

"What? No, no. Switched at birth, remember? Reapers, there's an unspoken rule about reproduction. They don't want to bring someone into that kind of life. My parents were the same; when they figured out they were expecting, they made a plan to drop me off with a human couple, hoping that the constant conditioning that I was a regular mortal would kill off my powers. And usually, that works. Go long enough and you won't even be immortal by the end of it. But sometimes you get cases like me, where something breaks into that wall and brings everything back to the surface. And then you have to decide; try to keep living as a half-assed human, or do something useful with your strengths. I chose the latter."

"Why?"

"Who knows? Truth be told, I just wanted to figure out how my powers worked and then drop out. But I didn't. That's how life works. Sometimes you just change your mind and you never find out why."

A long moment passed before he finally asked what I'd been waiting for; "What happened last month?"

"One of my coworkers was a serial killer back when he was human." I frowned a little, rubbed my shoulder. "He lasted a few decades before picking up again, and I was caught in the crossfire. I would've died that night if it weren't for a friend of mine by the name of William."

They exchanged a glance.

" _A man?"_

My brows furrowed slightly. _"Yeah. Why?"_

" _That's not a little…"_

"A little what?" I pulled my coffee closer. "You're scared he'll do something to me? He carried my bloody mess of a body straight to the hospital, checked in on me almost every day, let me cry on his shoulder when I got nightmares. I'm pretty fucking sure he's got better things on his mind than rape."

"Hey—watch your language, young lady."

I reeled at that, felt a harsh glare cross my face. "Little lady can't cuss? Surprise. I'm not a girl."

"You _what?_ "

"Yeah. Not really a boy either. I'm just... both. People are usually pretty chill about it. But I—I'm not even human and _that's_ your biggest concern? That's some misplaced priorities if you ask me."

"No. No," he said, shaking his head. "Is this why you called us here? To make up some nonsense about how you're the Grim Reaper?"

"Reapers. Plural. And you don't believe me? Ask my friend," I said, motioning to the registers. "Red highlights, glasses. Same eyes as me. Or I could show you a trick or two. Teleportation, invisibility, something like that. I'm sure it'll be enough. But you know what? I didn't meet up with you to let you know I'm not human. I met up so I could let you know I'm _safe,_ that I've healed and I'm still here."

Mom shifted a little in her seat, asked, _"Are you coming back?"_

"No, I don't think so. Not anytime soon. This is how my life's turned out, y'know? It's a job, same as any. I'll visit, sure, but I'm not quitting. Not if I can help it. I've got friends there, people who look up to me. People I look up to. I won't just leave that."

Thoughts of everyone I'd met flashed through my head, bits of conversations I'd had. Hope and courage passed on by strangers, those I never learned to recognize by name; Elliot's incongruously sincere words of advice, handed to me between an afternoon smoke; William's undivided sympathy towards everything I shared with him those nights alone in the hospital. Every tear, every hopeless moment. He was there.

Suffering through untimely deaths, spending days upon days bent over pages of data—those parts were never fun. But I wouldn't trade it away if it meant parting with the friends I'd made through the chaos. That's what I told my parents, curled up in the chair with my knees up and an empty cup in my hand. And they listened—and after a while, they agreed.

" _We'll see each other again,"_ I said.

At that, I stood up, took a few seconds to pull my shirt flat, retie my shoes, and toss the empty cup in a nearby trash can, and then went over and caught my parents in a group hug. I stepped back, gave them a weary smile, and started walking. Out the building, onto the edge of the sidewalk, and then, after fading into invisibility and waiting for a minute, I leapt into the back of a truck and headed on my way.

Part of me was filled with horrible regret, a burning, aching pain deep inside my chest, but another part felt calmer and more free than I had ever been in my entire life. I was no longer bound by the same restrictions that I had been before, and like the cold autumn wind smashing against my skin, it felt _good_.

The driver stopped at my street, at which point I hopped off and started walking, headed for the thick forest nearby. Then it turned into a light jog; then, a run; and by the time I had entered the woods, I was in a full-on sprint, powered by nothing but mad euphoria. I sped up when the two trees came into view and took a leap.


End file.
